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by sinceyoufellinlovewithme
Summary: Robert Crawley, a young finance professional and the heir to an English earldom, meets art student Cora Levinson on the New York subway one afternoon. The pair slowly fall in love...and then the unexpected turns their plans upside down.
1. Chapter 1

AN: Hello, everyone! I'm back a month sooner than I promised. :-) I have had some writing time here and there around my summer courses, but not enough to keep up with regular updates, so I haven't been posting. Now, however, I've written enough chapters ahead in this story that I'm confident I can keep up with weekly posting, even if I don't write for a week here and there. And I have missed you all and your reviews! :-)

This is a modern AU based on a one-shot I posted several months ago in my "The Ways They Said It" collection. Chapter 1 is basically that one-shot with a few slight changes. Since many of you have already read a version of Chapter 1, I'll be posting twice this weekend, with Chapter 2 going up on Sunday. I'm planning to post every Sunday (American Sunday, so that may be early Monday morning for those of you in Europe and points farther east).

And now, let's get rolling!

* * *

 **September 2016**

Robert forced himself to focus on the screen in front of him. He'd been skeptical when his sister had presented a Kindle as his going-away present last week, thinking it far too modern for his taste—although he was a young man, Robert had never fancied himself much a fan of technology—but he'd been surprised to discover how much he liked it. It was certainly convenient for travel, allowing him to relocate temporarily to New York for an extended work assignment without having to haul boxes of books with him. And it was also convenient to slip into his pocket each day, a light piece of plastic weighing far less than even most paperbacks, allowing him to occupy himself anywhere.

Although perhaps not on the subway, not while he was gripping the pole over his head and endeavoring not to tumble into the lap of a seated passenger. He'd read the same sentence five times, too distracted by the motion of the train and the pulsing mass of humanity around him to make sense of the words. Frustrated, Robert shoved his Kindle into the pocket of his suit coat. He was beginning to hate New York.

Yes, London's Tube was crowded at 5:15 on a Friday, too, but somehow it had never seemed quite this bad. Perhaps it was the volume of these Americans—the woman next to him was positively shouting into his ear as she tried to converse with her friend—or the awful way they mangled the English language. Or perhaps it was the pushing and the shoving and the elbows that kept catching him in the ribs, the bags that kept slamming into him. Did no one say excuse me in this country?

His assignment was meant to last for six months, with the possibility of an extension in the spring. At the moment, he couldn't imagine staying here another six days.

The car slowed, preparing for its next stop, and Robert braced himself, dreading the influx of new passengers. Yes, people got off at each stop, but even more seemed to get on, to the point that surely, the train would grind to a halt, unable to drag their collective weight any further. That was very much how the lower half of his body was beginning to feel. He'd walked miles today, he suspected, dragged on and off the wretched subway by his new co-workers to meetings that of course were never in his own building.

Oh, but who was gathering his things, putting his newspaper away, getting ready to stand? The man seated just to his right! _He could have a seat!_

"This is 8th Street, NYU," said a disembodied voice. When the other man stood, Robert lunged for his vacated spot, beating the passengers on both sides of him to it. He'd seen this happen on the subway plenty of times in the two weeks he'd been here, and at first he'd been appalled—this every-man-for-himself, vulture-like behavior was _not_ how it was done in London.

 _I'm one of_ them _now,_ he thought, rather disgusted with himself. But the feeling didn't last more than a second, so glad was he to be off his feet.

Twice as many New Yorkers as had just gotten off poured through the doors, jamming themselves into the tiniest cracks between other commuters, but Robert smiled to himself. Let them all force their way on. _He_ had a seat.

"Please watch the closing doors," the voice said again. "This is an N line train, toward Astoria Ditmars. The next stop is 14th Street, Union Square. Transfers available to the L, 4, 5, and 6 lines."

The train lurched forward again, but not all of the commuters had settled into position, and thus there was an intensified grumbling as everyone tried to work their way toward a pole without falling over. No matter. _He_ had a seat.

"Watch where you're pointing that thing!" he heard someone snarl, and Robert looked around for the source of the words. He would not deny that there could be something very entertaining in watching these New Yorkers snap at each other.

The complaint had issued from a portly, middle-aged man in a business suit toward a pretty, dark-haired young woman in a casual, stylish-a-few-years-ago dress. She was carrying…well, everything. A bulging messenger bag was strapped over her shoulder, and she was hunched slightly, as though afraid it would slip off. Her right arm was struggling to hug two long, plastic tubes to her chest, and in her left hand she was grasping the edge of what appeared to be a large oil painting. Carrying the latter was clearly meant to be a two-handed job, and Robert guessed that it was the offending object which had poked the man next to her. Why on earth would someone who could afford to buy artwork attempt to carry it home on the crowded Metro, rather than hailing a cab?

"Oh, I _am_ sorry, sir," the young woman said, her voice strained. It was a lovely voice, Robert could not help but notice—an American accent, yes, but still soft, almost velvety, in spite of the stress it seemed to hold.

The man grunted in reply, and the girl attempted to edge away from him, trying to reposition the painting so as not to jab anyone else with its sharp corners. She was, Robert noticed, limping, and he realized that when she'd been still, she'd had all her weight on her left leg.

Someone ought to let her sit down. Not him, of course—she was not directly in front of him, and there were other occupied seats closer to her. Surely someone would get up, wouldn't they? He watched the seated passengers expectantly, but no one so much as twitched.

 _Not your problem, mate,_ he told himself, trying to ignore the squirming guilt in this stomach. _There are multiple seats between you and her. You shouldn't have to give her yours._

The car was slowing again and lurched to a stop—"This is 14th Street, Union Square"—and he saw the girl with the painting wince as the motion forced her to shift weight onto her right leg. Maybe someone near her would get off, and she could take one of their seats…but no one was moving.

"Excuse me," he said as the door opened. "Excuse me." But she either did not hear him or did not recognize that he was speaking to her, and she did not glance his way.

He stretched his arm across several other passengers—none of whom looked up from their phones—to touch her arm. "Excuse me, ma'am?"

Her head jerked up in his direction. "Ma'am?" she snapped. "How old do I _look_?"

Robert cringed. "Not old! Not old, sorry. I only…"

She sighed, regret coloring her face. "I'm sorry; it's been a long day. What is it?"

"Would you like to take my seat?"

"Oh!" She blushed deeply. "How kind of you—yes, yes, I would, if you don't mind."

He did mind, but he minded worse sitting while she stood. She managed to squeeze past the passengers between them, dragging her painting and her tubes and her bag with her, and she slid into his seat as he vacated it, closing her eyes for a second in relief.

"Thank you," she said, opening them and smiling up at him. She had a sweet, round face, and her smile made pretty dimples around her nose, raising her high cheekbones. He felt slightly weak at having this smile directed at him. "I turned my ankle this morning trying to step over my cat," she explained.

"And did you manage to step over her?" he asked. He smiled back down at her hesitantly, suddenly irrationally afraid he could have lettuce, or some other leftover of lunch, in his teeth.

"I did," she said, laughing softly. "And I got a hiss and a dark glare for my trouble."

Of course she had. Robert had never much liked cats.

"I thought I might take a cab today to cut my walking," she went on, "but budgets, y'know?" He nodded, but he didn't, quite. The heir to an earldom who had stepped right out of Oxford into a lucrative finance job, he could not imagine not springing for a cab if it hurt him to walk.

He glanced down at the painting, which was now resting on the floor in front of her, learning against her legs. It depicted a cathedral surrounded by a forest of autumn leaves, in an almost impressionistic style. "That's very pretty," he remarked after a moment, wanting to kick himself for the dullness of his conversation. Why could he not think of anything intelligent to say?

The girl blushed again, giving him a shy smile, and it occurred to him that perhaps she was the artist and not the purchaser. "Do you like it?" she asked. "My professor told me it was terrible."

"It's not," he said, feeling suddenly protective. "Are you a student?" He'd thought her near his own age—several years past university.

"Yes, I'm in grad school. I'm doing an MFA in studio art at NYU."

Of course. No wonder she had no money. The lightbulb clicked on in his head as he recalled that she'd gotten on at the New York University stop. The tubes must hold paintings, too, he realized—watercolors, perhaps.

"Somewhere you've traveled in Europe?" he asked after a pause, nodding at the canvas.

"No, that's here in New York, actually—the Cloisters."

 _"Here?"_ A medieval cathedral in this modern urban jungle?

She smiled again. "Surprising, isn't it? It's quite far uptown—almost to the tip of Manhattan. And it doesn't feel like New York at all, because it's in the most beautiful park overlooking the Hudson. It's an art museum—medieval art, mostly, and the building's a mix of bits of old cathedrals and castles that were all shipped over from Europe and reassembled here. It's quite magical, really—I love it up there."

It _sounded_ magical, and he was suddenly hungry to be there with her.

"But _you're_ from Europe, too," she went on, her eyes twinkling. "Where in England are you from?"

"London, recently. But I grew up in Yorkshire."

"I've been to London," she told him, with another pretty smile. "One of those American tourists constantly overrunning your city."

She could overrun whatever she wanted to, as far as he was concerned.

"Where are you from?" he asked, suspecting the answer was not New York.

"Cincinnati…Ohio," she amended, when she saw his blank expression. "The Midwest. I only moved here a year ago for my program."

"Approaching Times Square, 42nd Street," the announcing voice said as the train began to slow again. Times Square already? He hadn't noticed the last few stops, clearly. "Transfers available to the S, 1, 2, 3, and 7 lines."

The girl was gathering up her things, and he realized with a sinking feeling that she was preparing to go. "Is this your stop?" he asked, trying to keep the disappointment out of his voice.

"Not entirely." She smiled ruefully. "I transfer to the 1 here, and then I've got another thirteen stops, although I doubt I'll find anyone as kind as you who lets me sit down."

And then, of course, she would have to hike to her apartment, wherever it was she lived. _This isn't your problem,_ he told himself again. _She can walk and stand; it's a sore ankle, not a broken leg._

But then she stood, and Robert watched her grimace as her ankle took her weight again, and he felt an odd tightening in his chest. He reached for his wallet and pulled out one of the American bills labelled _20_ , the one with the guy with the wild hair on it. But was twenty dollars enough? Thirteen stops implied some distance. He took out a second twenty.

"Here," he said, offering her the money. "Take a cab, please."

She stared at it. "Oh, I couldn't! I—you shouldn't, really—"

"Please," he said. On impulse, he took her hand and closed her fingers around the bills. "I'll worry, otherwise."

"It's—it's too much, too much for a single cab ride—"

"Then keep the change, and take a cab tomorrow, too. Or use it to have your dinner delivered."

She tried to pass the money back, but he pushed her hand away. "I…thank you," she said softly, stunned and flustered. "Thank you very much. This…this is so very kind. I won't forget it."

"Times Square, 42nd Street," the voice announced as the doors swung open.

"Thank you," she murmured again, touching his arm lightly as she turned to go.

"Wait! What's your name?" he blurted out, suddenly realizing he had not gotten this crucial piece of information and that he had no way to see her again. And oh, how desperately he wanted to see her again.

She froze, something like fear in her eyes, and he realized he'd scared her, handing her a wad of cash and then demanding her name, as though he wanted something from her. He cursed himself for not asking earlier—he certainly could not get her number _now_. He would still see her again, he told himself, trying to quell his panic at her departure. It didn't matter how many days he had to spend strolling the streets around NYU, hoping to happen upon her.

"Cora," she said hesitantly, after an eternal second. "My name's Cora."

"I'm Robert," he replied. "Robert Crawley."

She nodded, giving him another of those perfect smiles when he didn't press her for more. "Thank you, Robert. Have a good weekend."

"You too," he said as she stepped awkwardly off the train and the doors closed behind her, _"Cora."_

He turned the name over and over again in his mind as he took his seat back, the syllables swishing together like light gold necklaces. Cora, Cora, _Cora_.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: I changed Baxter's first name in this AU because I just couldn't buy the idea of a young woman in 2016 being named Phyllis. My apologies if one of you is named Phyllis—I do think it's a nice name—but in my experience, it's only ever belonged to women in my grandma's generation. Which is why it works for the show, but I just didn't feel like it worked here. Sorry if that drives anyone crazy!

* * *

"Cora?" she heard her roommate call out as she let herself into the apartment and dropped her painting against the wall. Felice Baxter popped her head out from her bedroom, down the hall from the front door. "Did you get home all right?"

Felice was Cora's closest friend in New York—her only close friend in New York, really. Cora had always been rather guarded, a quiet girl who wanted to make friends but who was often too shy and who kept too much to herself to fully pull it off. Felice, however, seemed much the same way, and their similar personalities, which contrasted sharply with the vivacity of most of their fellow art students, had drawn them together. Cora liked her a great deal, and she had found Felice's warmth and solicitousness very comforting as she made a life for herself in a strange new city. They had moved in together just a month ago, when each of their leases from the previous year had run out, and Cora was quickly finding that, rent savings aside, it was far more pleasant to have a friend at home to talk with in the evenings.

"Yes, fine," Cora answered. _Thanks to Robert Crawley, whoever he had been._

"How's your ankle? I've been worrying about you."

"It's a bit worse, I think," Cora said. "It's all right, though." But she could not hold back a hiss of pain as she removed her right shoe. She'd had nothing more than a dull ache when she'd left that morning, and her ankle had looked perfectly normal, but it was quite clear that she had done herself no favors by walking on it all day. It was now swollen and puffy and sore to the touch, with an ugly bruise on the outer side. A steady throbbing had been beginning when she'd last seen Felice at lunchtime, reaching a painful peak on her evening commute. How grateful she'd been to sink into the backseat of a cab in Times Square, knowing she would not have to stand on another subway train and then walk the three blocks back to her apartment.

"I think that's more than a bit worse, and I don't think you're the least bit all right," Felice said softly, coming to her side. "Here, you sit down, and I'll get you some ice." She took Cora's arm and helped her to the couch, then darted into the apartment's tiny kitchen.

 _Ice._ That sounded wonderful, Cora thought as she stretched her legs in front of her and settled a throw pillow under her ankle. She ought to have gone into her studio late this morning and made time for a bit of first aid when she'd first stumbled, but she'd had so very much to do, and it really hadn't hurt like this _then_. She said a silent prayer of thanks for Robert's generosity—she didn't think she could have walked three more blocks like this, much less balanced on her feet for a long subway ride.

Cora heard a soft _meow_ and looked up to see her cat, Sarah, watching curiously from her favorite spot on the bookcase, her tail switching back and forth above her.

"I hope you're pleased with yourself," she muttered, feeling a stab of irritation at her pet, whose fault the whole incident had been. The cat did not respond, and Cora sighed. "You know I can't stay mad at you, don't you?" she said.

As though the cat had recognized this as an invitation, Sarah leapt down from the bookcase to join Cora, purring as she sandwiched herself between her human's hip and the back of the couch. Cora stroked her behind her ears, earning a deeper purr.

"Do you think you should see a doctor?" she heard Felice say and looked up to see her stepping back into the room, a dishtowel in her hand that Cora assumed was filled with ice.

Cora shook her head. "No, I don't think it's worth the bother."

Felice gave Cora's ankle a longer look than she herself had and touched her fingers gently against the swelling. "Does that hurt?"

"Only a bit, like you're touching a bad bruise."

"And you can move it, obviously." Felice arranged the ice carefully over the ankle. "We'll keep an eye on it this weekend, but I think you'll be fine. Would you like me to make you something to eat?"

"That's sweet, but no—I'll have something delivered for us both, my treat." She did not think the remains of Robert's money would stretch to cover dinner for both of them, but she suspected that Felice, who had a tendency to play the mother in spite of their similar ages, would spend much of the evening and ensuing weekend looking after her.

"You don't have to do that—"

"And you don't have to wait on me all weekend, because I _can_ walk, but I suspect you're going to do it anyway," Cora said, drawing a sheepish smile from her roommate. "Is the Thai place okay?" she asked, digging for her phone in the purse she'd dropped on the floor next to her.

"Yes, thank you. I'll take the Pad Thai noodles…and I'll get drinks while you call?"

Cora nodded as she dialed. "Just a glass of water is fine."

Felice returned to the front room as Cora was hanging up. "I brought you some Advil, too," she said, setting her own glass on the coffee table and then passing Cora hers, against which she had pressed two small pills. "That looks like it hurts." She nodded to Cora's ankle.

"Thanks. It does, yeah, but you're very sweet to fuss."

"I wish you hadn't had such a long trip home," Felice said. She plopped down in the garish-but-comfortable orange chair the girls had acquired from one of last year's graduates. "I think fighting the subway at rush hour was probably the worst thing you could have done—you had to stand, I'm sure."

"Actually, I didn't—a very sweet guy gave me his seat on my first train."

"Oh, how nice! I love hearing there are still sweet men out there."

"It wasn't just the seat," Cora went on, smiling at the memory. "He also handed me forty dollars when I got off to change at Times Square and told me to take a cab."

"What?" Felice laughed in delighted surprise. "Are you serious? Someone gave you forty dollars? How have you not mentioned this?"

"Well, you hadn't asked yet," Cora said, laughing herself. "But yes, someone gave me forty dollars for a cab, so actually, getting home was the easiest part of my day."

"Start from the beginning," Felice instructed, settling in her chair and crossing her arms.

"Well, the N train was packed, of course, and so I was standing, with my stuff and the painting—the one Goodson hated so much—and trying to balance on one leg, and suddenly someone was tapping me on my arm." She told Felice about Robert, their conversation, and his final, gentle insistence that she take a taxi.

"And he was young?" Felice asked.

"Yes, maybe a bit older than us, but not much."

"And you thought he was handsome."

"I didn't say that!"

Felice laughed gently. "You didn't have to. I can hear it in your voice. Young, handsome, sweet, and I assume wealthy, if he's handing out cash to perfect strangers."

"He looked wealthy," Cora agreed. "His suit was very nice—probably some Wall Street banker. That train comes from the financial district."

" _So_ …are we going to look him up? You should find him online and contact him so he can take you out if he wants to."

This was, of course, exactly what Cora wanted to do, but it seemed far too forward. It was also the last thing she'd expected Felice to suggest—in fact, she'd been nursing a secret hope that her friend would give her a ready excuse to run from any attempt to find Robert Crawley.

"You don't think…doesn't it seem a little dangerous? I mean, it was so _extravagant_ of him to give me the money…you don't think there's some…odd motive there?"

"You mean, do I think he's a serial killer who finds his victims by picking out girls on the subway with injured ankles, handing them cab fare, and then hoping they contact him? No, I don't think that. I also don't think it was that extravagant from his perspective, not if he's wealthy. It would be like you, handing someone in line in the campus cafeteria five dollars because they ran out of meal points."

Cora smiled at the analogy. "That's not quite what I meant. I just meant, you don't find it…I don't know…controlling, or something? I'd have thought you…you…"

Felice sighed softly, dropping her eyes to her lap, and Cora fell silent. Last year, after a young man's attempt to get her number during a night out with Cora had left her in tears, Felice had confessed that her most recent relationship had been an abusive one. She'd spent the better part of college, and the year after graduation, trembling in fear of the man she thought she loved—a man who had quickly morphed from smooth to controlling to cruel. In the end, Peter had pressed her into stealing from the cash register of the restaurant where she'd been waitressing, and she'd been arrested. She'd been sentenced only with community service in exchange for testifying against her boyfriend, and her hours were finished now, but the years she'd spent with him were not so easily swept away. The emotional scars of his beatings still had not healed, and she was skittish around any men who displayed any interest in her. As she'd sobbed that night, "I'm not _ready_. I don't think I'm _ready_ to date again."

"I don't think you've got anything to fear from this Robert, Cora," Felice said now. "He's kind, and he's selfless. Peter was never either of those things, even when he first swept me off my feet. It would never have entered his head to do something sacrificial, even if it was just giving up a seat at the end of a long day. I think Robert Crawley is genuinely sweet—which is enough of a reason to contact him, even if he weren't handsome and wealthy."

"You don't think it's too forward?"

"No, I think it's what he wants. He would have called you if you'd given him your number, but you didn't even give him your full name, and he didn't want to press you—which also speaks well of him. I think he gave you his last name because he's hoping you'll find him. And you haven't got to ask him to marry you—just send him an email or a Facebook message and tell him how much you appreciated the cab, then see what he does from there."

Cora could think of no reason not to do this—it even seemed the right, _polite_ thing to do—and so she nodded, determined to see what Google would turn up for her. But before she could unlock her phone screen again, the doorbell rang, and Felice stood to answer it.

They were soon settled in for the evening, lounging with their dinner, Sarah curled up next to Cora, who was occasionally feeding her bits of chicken stir fry. There was, Cora knew, no question of the cat abandoning her for roommate: Sarah had come to New York with her, and, while Felice tolerated the animal, they had never seemed much suited to one another.

"All right, let's see what we get online for our mysterious benefactor," Cora said, prompting a giggle from Felice. She typed _Robert Crawley_ into her phone's Google Chrome search box.

 _Robert Andrew Crawley – Sanders Blackwell,_ read the first heading. Cora glanced at the summary: _Mr. Crawley's practice is concentrated in employment law, complex commercial litigation, and class actions. He joined Sanders Blackwell in 1991 and is a member of the firm._ "We have an attorney who's been in practice since '91…definitely not him," she said.

She scrolled to the next entry. _: Robert Crawley: Books._ "Oh, maybe he's an author," she murmured. That appealed to her artistic sensibilities far more than a banker or a stock broker.

"This young?" she heard Felice say skeptically, and when she tapped the link, it was clear it wasn't him—this Robert had written seven thrillers, which she doubted he'd had time for yet. Cora hit the back button and scrolled further down the search results.

"There's eight LinkedIn profiles for Robert Crawley's," she said. "I'd think a young businessman with a career in London and New York would have LinkedIn, wouldn't you?" Perhaps there would even be a photo that would let her easily identify him.

She tapped the link, and there was the attorney again, as well as a teacher and the manager of a deli, but the fourth entry on the list… "Oh, here's his photo!" she exclaimed. "It says, 'Investment Banking Analyst, HSBC…New York, New York.'"

"Oh, let me see him!" Felice leaned over and took Cora's phone. "He's cute," she said approvingly. "Very cute."

She passed the phone back, and Cora opened Robert's page and skimmed over it. "He graduated from Oxford," she began.

"Of course he did."

"And it was two years before we finished undergrad," Cora went on, "so he's maybe twenty-six, and he seems to have been working at HSBC since graduation…he was in the London office first, and now he's in New York. And no, we don't have any connections in common."

"Can you send him mail through the site?"

"I could, but…" Cora thought for a moment, considering the idea. "I think that's rather cold and impersonal—and it doesn't have anything to do with his work anyway. I'm thinking…wouldn't it be better to send a handwritten note? I'm sure I can find his office address, now that I know who he works for."

Felice smiled. "Handwritten is definitely more _you_. Where's your stationery?"

"The drawer of my nightstand…thank you," she added as Felice stood to retrieve it.

Her roommate returned a moment later with a pen, a sheet of paper with a swirly _C_ at the top, and a book for her to write against, and then Felice curled up in the chair again, fiddling with her own phone as Cora began her note.

 _Dear Robert,_ she wrote, _I wanted to tell you how grateful I was for the cab fare you gave me this afternoon. I'm still stunned to think a stranger was so generous, but I'm also touched that you were so kind. Nor could I be any more appreciative—I don't think I could have stood on another train and then walked home with my ankle in this state. It was a wonderful relief to be able to sink into the backseat of a cab and be driven to my doorstep, and it was wonderful of you to provide that for me. Thank you for being so very, very kind._

Cora chewed her lip, trying to decide how to sign it. "Sincerely" or "best wishes" sounded so businesslike; "yours" seemed far too presumptuous. After a moment's debate, she simply wrote _Cora Levinson_.

Should she give him her email or her phone number? She wasn't putting a return address on the letter—telling him exactly where she lived seemed a bit dicey for a man she didn't know, although she agreed with Felice's instinct that Robert was quite safe. Slapping her email or number down seemed to imply that she expected him to contact her, that she wanted more than just to say thank you. She didn't want to seem to be throwing herself at him. Yet how was he to find her, otherwise? He'd have her full name, she supposed, and he even knew where she went to school…surely he could find her online, just as she had found him?

Still debating, Cora picked up her phone again, pressing the back button to peruse Robert's search results some more. There were two Facebook pages, too—she tapped the first one, and it was not him, but when she tried the second, which gave his middle name as "Edward," his now-familiar face popped up beneath a cover photo of a green field that had to be English countryside. Everything else, unfortunately, appeared to be locked down.

She scrolled further down the search results and saw a page titled _Patrick George Crawley, 10_ _th_ _Earl of Grantham – Wikipedia_. Whatever had brought that up? But then her eyes fell on the summary, which included the phrase, "His heir apparent is his son, Robert Edward Crawley." Cora smiled to herself—how funny, she thought, to have the same name as an aristocrat. Out of idle curiosity—for she no more thought this was the same Robert than she had suspected it of the lawyer-since-1991 or the author of seven novels—she tapped the link.

Wikipedia filled her screen. "Patrick George Crawley, 10th Earl of Grantham, (born 7 October 1957) is a British hereditary peer. His heir apparent is his son, Robert Edward Crawley." Yes, that much she'd read in the search results. Cora scrolled down for more.

"Crawley is the eldest son of Edward Crawley, 9th Earl of Grantham (1930-2011), and his wife, Mary Finch (born 1932). He has one brother, William Crawley, and was educated at Eton College and Balliol College, Oxford. He resides at the family estate, Downton Abbey, in Yorkshire, where he has considerable property holdings.

"Crawley married Lady Violet Grenville in 1985. The couple have two children:

Lady Rosamund Elizabeth Crawley (born 1 April 1988). She married Marmaduke Painswick in 2014.

Lord Robert Edward Crawley, Viscount Downton (born 14 June 1990)."

A man with the same middle name, born the same year, who would have grown up in the same area that _her_ Robert Crawley had claimed to be from? Surely that was more than a coincidence. Of course he would be wealthy. Of course he would step right out of university and into a lucrative career with a prestigious company. Of course.

Her hands trembling, Cora typed _Robert Crawley, Viscount Downton_ into the search bar and then flipped to an image search. Quite a few photos appeared of the young man she'd just met, she supposed from tabloids—Robert in a sports uniform, Robert attending a society party with a beautiful woman (Cora's heart skipped a beat until she saw that the caption identified her as his sister, Lady Rosamund), even the headshot she'd seen on his LinkedIn page. Robert-from-the-subway was clearly also Robert, Viscount Downton. Whatever a _viscount_ was.

She had been rescued, apparently, by some lesser version of a British prince."

"I don't think I'm going to do this," she said quietly, and Felice looked up.

"Do what? Write to Robert? Cora, I really think—"

Cora shook her head. "He's an _aristocrat_." She handed Felice her phone. "Look."

Felice skimmed the article. "Oh, how romantic! Why shouldn't you write to him? He's kind and generous and handsome, _and_ he has a title, and you know he's interested in you!"

"He's _not_ , though," she said, feeling her cheeks burn with embarrassment that she'd once thought so. Robert Crawley had been kind not out of any interest or desire to see her again, but out of some sense of noblesse oblige, some feeling of pity for the girl who couldn't walk but who had no spare cash. "An English aristocrat does not want a starving artist he picks up on the New York subway."

"Cora—"

"No, I can't. I don't _want_ to." She absolutely could not write to this man—the incident was humiliating enough in her memory.

One of the things Cora liked best about Felice was that she knew when not to push, and she did not disappoint now, simply nodding in response to Cora's words.

"Do you want to watch a movie tonight?" Felice suggested. "One of your Austen movies?" Cora knew her friend couldn't fathom her love for Jane Austen and hated any period piece, so this was a truly sacrificial offer. "It might make you feel a bit better."

Cora also knew that, while this comment was, on the surface, a reference to her ankle, it was also a mark of the fact that Felice understood precisely how she felt about Robert Crawley.

"That sounds nice," she said, managing a small smile. "Do you mind fishing _Sense & Sensibility _out of the DVD pile?"

"Of course. Are you done eating?" Cora nodded. "I'll throw the take-out containers away," Felice said, gathering their trash. "And," she added, giving Cora a knowing smile, "I'll see if I can find you some ice cream in the freezer, too."

"Thank you," Cora said quietly, suddenly as grateful for Felice as she had been for Robert's forty dollars. "Thanks for all of this."

Robert didn't matter, she tried to tell herself. There was no reason to think about him any further. She'd only decided to contact him at all because her friend had talked her into it. She should just be grateful for a nice dinner and a cab ride home and the many steps he'd saved her ankle.

Yet as she watched her roommate retreat back into the kitchen, she felt an aching emptiness in her chest.


	3. Chapter 3

_Strolling the streets around NYU._ Robert had repeated his original plan to himself many times in the weeks since his meeting with Cora, and it only seemed dumber every time he thought of it. As though the campus, or Greenwich Village where it was situated, was a small, sparsely-populated area. As though it was realistic to imagine that if he stood on the same corner long enough, Cora-from-the-N-train would happen by.

It also wasn't a plan that was particularly feasible for him to implement. She was likely at NYU far more often during business hours—hours he spent holed up in his office—and he suspected the odds of finding her there in the evening or on weekends were considerably less than the chance of meeting her on campus at ten in the morning. He did know roughly where she lived, given the subway directions she'd mentioned that day, but he could hardly go wandering around there: unlike the Village, it was a dull, not-particularly-wealthy, residential neighborhood just north of Harlem, and he could think of no excuse for why he'd bother to go there otherwise. If he were lucky enough to cross paths with her on her own street, he'd look like a stalker.

 _That's because you_ are _stalking her,_ he told himself sometimes. Then he'd argue back that he couldn't possibly be stalking her if he hadn't even managed to see her a second time. _Ah, but you're looking for her, aren't you?_ the voice in his head would say. _And you know she doesn't want to be found. If she wanted to be found, she'd have at least given you her last name._

There were, he knew, many reasons that Cora might have no interest in seeing him again. Perhaps she was married, though he'd seen no ring. Perhaps she had a boyfriend…or a _girl_ friend. Perhaps she was busily finishing her degree for a December graduation and thus saw no reason to get involved with a man in New York when she'd be leaving the city in a couple months. For all he knew, she was already gone—perhaps she'd been about to leave for a semester in Florence or Paris or some other artsy city.

He tried to tell himself that one of these things was the case, and, should he happen to see her again, it wouldn't matter anyway. She'd never been going to date him.

Yet he could not get her soft blue eyes and her warm smile out of his head.

It was weeks before the obvious confronted him: on the subway one afternoon, his eyes fell on a tourist with a shopping bag…labelled _The Cloisters_. Of course! He'd been so busy remembering Cora's face that he'd given little thought to their conversation, but of course she'd mentioned a place she loved. He'd been interested in it for its own sake, but mightn't he run into her there? Perhaps she went often. She'd said it was peaceful and secluded and nothing like the rest of Manhattan…perhaps it was her favorite place to spend a Sunday afternoon.

He resolved to go that weekend.

* * *

Of course, Robert did not find Cora at The Cloisters. It was a large complex in the midst of an even larger park, and he suspected that, rather like the NYU campus, he'd have no guarantee of meeting up with her even if she were present at the same time. What he found instead was a beautiful amalgamation of cathedrals and castles and cloisters, sometimes reminding him of Spain or France or Italy but, more often than he'd expected, reminding him of England and pointing out just how homesick he was. The art he could take or leave—much to his mother's disappointment, given the breadth of the collection at Downton, Robert had never had much interest in art—but the museum itself was, as Cora had promised, almost magical.

And so he found himself going back often, just to walk the stone halls and to sit in the courtyards, enjoying the peace and the reminders of Yorkshire and the perfect weather of early autumn in New York. He hoped, of course, that someday, he'd turn around and see Cora, but he doubted it. This was not, he was beginning to realize, a city in which you ever met anyone more than once.

* * *

"Robert?"

Surprised to hear his name, Robert looked up from the bench he was sitting on in The Cloisters' Spanish-style garden that overlooked the Hudson River…and there was Cora, Cora-from-the-N-train, standing in front of him, surprise and delight on her face. "You're Robert Crawley, aren't you?" she asked.

"Aren't you?" she repeated a few seconds later, her smile faltering, and he realized that in his shock, he had not responded.

 _Yes, of course, and I'm so glad to finally run into you!_ he wanted to say. _It's beautiful here; I'm so glad you told me about it_. But the words wouldn't come, and all he could do was nod.

"I thought I recognized you." Cora smiled again, and he was glad he was already sitting down. "You're the man who gave me cab fare the day I'd hurt my ankle…do you remember me?"

Did he _remember_ her? He'd only been thinking about her for weeks on end, imagining her eyes and her smile…which, he was pleased to note, were even prettier than he had remembered. "Of course I remember you!" he exclaimed. "Of course!" She smiled more broadly, and he could tell she was pleased. "If anything, I'd have thought you would have forgotten _me_ by now," he went on.

"How often do you think people I don't even know hand me forty dollars on my way home?" she answered with gentle laughter. "Although I suppose that's why you remember it, too—you're not in the habit of giving cab fare to perfect strangers!"

He was struck that there could be no better description of her: she had been an absolutely _perfect_ stranger. He did not think she was ever anything less than perfect, nor did he think anyone who met her ever forgot her. Robert wanted desperately to say all this, to tell her how perfect he thought she was, to tell her that his memory of her had absolutely nothing to do with his money, but his tongue seemed to have tied itself in knots…and Cora was still talking anyway.

"That really was wonderfully kind of you," she said, and a month later there still seemed to be gratitude in her eyes. "I'm not sure I had it in me at that point to get on another train and then walk home from the station."

He smiled. "No, you didn't look like you did."

"And then," she said, laughing again, "I used the change the way you said, and ordered out for Thai and had it delivered, and then I laid on the couch all evening with my feet up and felt luxuriously decadent."

"I'm glad," he said, meaning it. As much as he'd intended the cab fare to prevent him from worrying, he'd worried anyway that evening, about whether she had made it home all right, and whether she had a roommate to help her, and whether she'd be able to take the weekend to rest. No amount of mental scolding that his worry was silly and unnecessary had stopped it, and it was a relief somehow, even all these weeks later, to learn that she'd been taken care of…and taken care of by him.

Robert was also glad to hear the lovely sound of her laughter, which he was already deducing was a frequent sound. She'd laughed that day on the subway, he remembered suddenly—and of all things, at her own retelling of her injury.

"I wrote to you," she said suddenly. "I wrote you a note, to tell you how grateful I was."

He frowned. "I'm sorry; I never got it." What a terrible thing for the postal service to lose!

Cora laughed again. "Oh, I never sent it!"

"Oh, _that_ note," he said, grinning. "No, I didn't get the note you never sent. You didn't have my address, did you?"

"No, I did—I found you on LinkedIn, and I was going to send it to your office. It wasn't that." She blushed, and he could not help but think how much prettier the sudden pinkness in her cheeks made her. "It was…I wasn't sure you'd _want_ to hear from me."

She wasn't sure he'd want to hear from her? How much clearer could his interest have been?

"Of course I would have wanted to hear from you!" he exclaimed. "I've been hoping to see you again for weeks!"

Cora's blush deepened, but she smiled softly at his declaration. "It was only that…once I'd looked you up, I…saw who you were, and I thought…I don't know what I thought."

"Who I am?" he asked, puzzled.

She dropped her eyes, whispering the next words so quietly he might have missed them, if he weren't so accustomed to their sound: "Viscount Downton."

Ah. She'd seen his _title_. Robert had always assumed that the title that brought him deference and opened doors for him in England would mean nothing once he crossed the Atlantic, but a few weeks in New York had taught him otherwise. Indeed, it seemed to mean _more_ in America, where instead of polite nods, the word _Lord_ inspired open-mouthed gaping, tongue-tied waiters, and giggling women. He'd quickly learned to use his title as little as possible and spare himself the embarrassing attention.

Cora, however, was not giggling or throwing herself at him like so many of these American girls, who he suspected were intoxicated by the idea of a man who could fulfill whatever delusional princess fantasies they'd grown up with. She seemed instead to be almost embarrassed to be addressing him, embarrassed to have considered contacting him.

"Don't think of me that way," he said gently, almost afraid that she would bolt now that they were discussing the source of her discomfort. "I'm not Viscount Downton. I'm just…Robert Crawley, who would very much like for you to show him this museum, if you don't mind."

"You haven't already seen it?" she asked.

"I've seen it several times now, but never with an expert."

"I'm not sure I'm really—"

"Aren't you getting a graduate degree in this?"

"In making my own art! Not in art history…although I do have my undergrad in that."

Somehow that didn't surprise him. "Then I'll follow your lead," he said, standing.

He was relieved to see her smile again. "Well, we should start with the unicorn," she said, leading him back across the courtyard's garden toward the building. "Just inside here…you've seen him, right?"

He hadn't, actually. "I may have skipped that room," he admitted.

"Robert! The unicorn tapestries are the best bit of this museum! They're…they're the most beautiful tapestries in existence! One of the world's greatest works of art!"

"It just didn't…sound like my sort of thing," he said sheepishly.

Cora's eyes sparkled, and he was suddenly very glad that he'd skipped the tapestries, if it meant her expression would glow like this. "You think unicorns are for girls, don't you?"

That had rather been his logic, although he was embarrassed to hear it articulated. But then she laughed again, and his heart thrilled at the sound.

"I promise this is a very manly unicorn," she said. "It's hunted and wounded and almost killed by a bunch of aristocrats wielding spears."

"Sounds pleasant," he said as he stepped back inside after her.

"Oh, but it's glorious," she murmured, instinctively lowering her voice in the medieval building. "The unicorn _and_ the tapestries."

And it was, he realized the moment they walked into the tapestry room together. All four walls were covered, nearly floor to ceiling, in ornately woven scenes of a medieval court and a forest hunt and a suffering unicorn. The sheer scale of it alone would have been impressive, but there was such detail, and such workmanship, and such vivid colors, even after hundreds of years.

"I'm always so glad," Cora said softly, "that they're _hung_ here— a photo in a book of a tapestry is never the same as seeing it on a wall. We're seeing them just as they would have been seen by their original owners."

"And who was that?" he asked her. "Who owned these originally?"

"We're not entirely sure," she said. "We know they were owned for a couple hundred years by the La Rochefoucauld family in France, but they're mentioned in the family's inventory for the first time in the early 1700s, and their construction dates to around 1500. They could have always belonged to the La Rochefoucaulds, but that's thought to be unlikely. For awhile, people thought they were commissioned by a duchess to celebrate her marriage to the French king, but that theory's been very much refuted. I rather like it, though." She launched into a story of Anne of Brittany, telling him that the idea had originally come from the letters _A_ and _E_ for Anne's name, which had been stitched into the tapestry in several places.

"I like to think they were a wedding gift," she told him with a smile. "It wasn't unusual for tapestries to be given as wedding gifts among the nobility and the royals of medieval Europe—and the unicorn, of course, was a symbol of love and marriage."

"Was it?" he asked, interested at the thought that the unicorn had once had a more serious meaning than a theme for a little girl's birthday party.

"Yes, although to be honest, it might not be here. There's a great many theories about the meaning of the unicorn tapestries, because unicorns symbolized so many different things in so many different pieces of medieval art. Sometimes it's love, or lovers, and marriage; sometimes it's wisdom or immortality; or sometimes it's Christ Himself—the last one's a popular theory, that these tapestries are meant as a Christian allegory. But I don't think we'll ever really know, and I don't think the meaning's the point. I'd rather just…gaze at them, and enjoy them. I haven't got to know where they came from or what they mean."

He realized he'd been suddenly and inexplicably stressed when she'd first told him that scholars weren't sure what the tapestries depicted, but he rather liked the view she'd just expressed, the idea that she was happy enough simply to enjoy the beauty. He suspected this attitude of hers stretched to more than just medieval artwork.

Robert slowly followed Cora throughout the ancient halls and chapels, listening as she told him the stories and symbols behind the paintings and statues and carvings. The art was suddenly much more fascinating than he ever would have suspected, and the combination of her captivating tales and the warmth in her expression had him so entranced that the sudden loudspeaker announcement of, "The Cloisters will close in fifteen minutes," felt like a splash of cold water in his face in the midst of a long nap.

"They're closing early today?" he asked her, stunned and annoyed at the interruption.

Cora laughed. "No, not early. It's always 5:30 on a Sunday. Do you usually come on Saturdays? They're open later then."

"No, no." He was always here on a Sunday, and he knew well what time the museum closed. "It's just—I hadn't realized it was so late in the afternoon."

"Wonderful art will do that to you," Cora said with another smile. "I've often lost track of time in here."

Oh, but it hadn't been the _art_. He'd seen the art several times before. "I think it was more your tour," he told her.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," she said. "It was nice to have someone to share it with today."

Something in her posture suggested she was preparing to leave…and of course she was. They'd been all over the museum, and it would be closed in a matter of minutes.

He still didn't have her phone number…or for that matter, even a last name. Would he ever see her again? Was Cora-from-the-N-train going to slip off into the evening, just as she had a month ago?

"May I see you again?" Robert blurted suddenly.

"When did you have in mind?" she asked, and he winced inwardly, suspecting she was searching for an excuse.

"I…what about tonight?" he asked, unwilling to give up her company so soon. "Now? I could take you to dinner somewhere near here. Or wherever you like, really. It hasn't got to be around here—unless you've got a place nearby in mind. Or…that is, we'll do whatever you want." He could feel the tips of his ears going red as he rambled, and he forced himself to shut up, waiting for her to tell him that she had a boyfriend, or was far too busy with school, or had to get home to feed that awful cat, or just had no interest in him…perhaps spending the afternoon in his company had merely been a courtesy in gratitude for the cab fare.

And then he saw it, as she raised her hand to brush a strand of hair back from her face. A ring. A delicate gold ring with a round purple stone and two small diamond chips on each side. For a split second he couldn't breathe…and then he realized it was on her right hand, not her left. And surely no one would give a woman an amethyst for an engagement ring, would they? But…was it a gift from someone she was dating?

But then Cora smiled. "I think dinner would be lovely. But are you sure you don't want to choose the restaurant?"

Perhaps the ring was a gift from her parents, then. Robert shook his head. "No, you tell me where you'd like to go. I've only been here a few weeks—I imagine you know New York much better than I." That, and he doubted he could think coherently at the moment anyway, not now that he had found Cora-from-the-N-train, spent an afternoon in her company, and successfully scored a date with her, all in a few hours.

She smiled again. "This is my second year here, so yes, I imagine I do…have you been to Serendipity yet?" He shook his head again. "Oh, good. Let's go there. It's a bit of a journey from here, but it's one of my favorites."

"What do they serve?" he asked as they walked back to the front of the museum together.

"Oh, anything, really—pasta and chicken and fish and burgers and sandwiches and salads…whatever strikes you. But it's not really about the food—the food's fine, but it's really about the ice cream and the sundaes and the frozen hot chocolate."

"Frozen hot chocolate? Isn't that just…chocolate milk? Wait, I need to get my coat back—did you not bring one?"

"No, it's nothing like chocolate milk. It's cold, but it still tastes like hot chocolate—you'll see when you try it. And no, I didn't bring a coat—it wasn't that cold this afternoon," she said, following him to the coat check.

That, and she hadn't wanted to spend the money to check it, he suspected as he handed the attendant a few small bills to reclaim his own jacket.

"It'll be cooler now that it's evening, and once the sun sets," he said, eyeing the little knit dress she was wearing.

"We're much tougher in the Northeast than you are in London, Mr. Crawley," Cora said, her eyes twinkling as she watched him shrug on his coat. "If you're cold in October, I think you're going to have a very long New York winter."

"I'll have you know that I'm from Yorkshire, near the _old_ York, where our weather is far, far more miserable than anywhere in America. Last year, we had six months of winter, and then summer occurred on a Tuesday."

Another laugh from Cora—how he was growing to _love_ that sound! "I take it you won't be seeking work with the British tourism office."

They stepped out into the evening together, an autumn chill immediately evident in the air. The sun was not yet down—it was in the process of setting, highlighting the brilliant leaves of the park around The Cloisters so that Robert felt he and Cora were strolling through a forest of gold—but it had ceased to warm the city the way it had a few hours earlier. He saw Cora discreetly wrap her arms around herself, and he toyed with hailing a cab once they reached the street, but he rejected this idea immediately, suspecting that her hesitancy over his title meant that she would be put off by another display of money.

"I've never been to Yorkshire," she said as they walked, "but I immediately think of thatched roofs and fields of sheep. Will you tell me about it?"

He watched her fail to hide a shiver as a sharp breeze blew. "I will, but only if you agree to wear my jacket."

"I'm all right—and I don't want you to be cold!"

"I won't be," he lied, removing his coat. "I grew up in Yorkshire, remember?"

She laughed, and he moved to hand it to her, but then he realized she was turning around and holding her arms out…expecting him to help her with it. Robert gulped at the thought and then guided the sleeves onto her arms, his heart thrilling at the light touch he gave to her shoulders once it was on. He had a sudden urge to take her hand, but he didn't dare.

"Are you warm enough?" he asked as she turned back around.

There was a blush in Cora's cheeks now, as though she were just as thrilled at his presence as he was at hers, and she nodded. "I am, yes," she said softly. "I am."


	4. Chapter 4

It was shortly after six o'clock, the sky quickly growing dark, when Robert and Cora arrived at Serendipity in midtown. A relatively early hour on a Sunday evening meant that they were lucky enough to be seated right away, and a waiter led them to a table for two in a small alcove.

Cora always felt that a trip to Serendipity was like falling down the rabbit hole into Alice's Wonderland. The dining room walls were covered with oversized and quirky clocks, gilded mirrors, displays of stained glass, and paintings, while antique Tiffany lamps and wrought-iron chandeliers hung from the ceiling, each merely inches from the next. There were even a few perfectly-manicured topiaries to add a garden feel.

"I think," she told Robert as they sat down, "that I love the décor here almost as much as the desserts."

He looked around with renewed interest. "So you're fond of this?"

She blushed, afraid she heard a criticism in the remark. "I suppose it's probably a bit girly."

"No, I don't think so," he said thoughtfully. "It's unique, whimsical…the sort of restaurant my mind might come up with in a dream. It's a bit of a surprise, too—not what I expected from the outside." She knew what he meant—the exterior was merely a black, subdued storefront that held no hint of the vibrancy within.

Cora knew what she wanted—the _A La Garden of Allah_ , an exotically-named chicken covered in cucumbers and tomatoes and olives—and thus she discreetly watched Robert over the top of her menu as he perused his. He was the last person she had expected to run into this afternoon—or ever, frankly—but her shock when she'd first caught sight of him at The Cloisters had quickly turned to delight. She could not deny that Robert had weighed heavily on her mind over the past few weeks—perhaps as heavily as she seemed to have weighed on his—and she'd been thrilled at the chance to see him again. And then—rather like something out of a fairy tale—he'd not brushed her off after a cursory greeting but had been eager to spend the day with her.

He was, she realized as she surveyed his face, almost boyish, his brow furrowed with concentration as he read the menu, and he certainly seemed far more youthful in his weekend sweater and jeans than he had looked on the Metro in his business suit. She could see a sweetness in his expression, too, now that she was studying him at close range, a soft look in his blue eyes that seemed to promise kindness.

A promise he delivered on, Cora thought. He'd been selflessly kind to her both times they'd met, and what struck her most about him was how instinctive this kindness seemed. She'd sensed that his surrenders of his seat and his jacket had required little thought, that both gestures had been automatic reflexes in response to watching her limp and seeing her shiver. She did not think he had considered acting otherwise.

"What do you recommend?" he asked, and she savored the elegance of his accent.

"Well, I suppose that depends on what sort of food you like," she began.

"I'm not picky."

Somehow, she sensed that was a lie. "I'm getting the chicken _A La Garden of Allah_ ," she offered, and his brow tightened immediately, suggesting that the title alone was too exotic for him. She hid a smile, having suspected from the beginning that Robert Crawley was not an adventurous type in any way.

"I was thinking," he said, "that I ought to get something very American, since this is the first time I've been out with an American girl." Cora felt her face warming at the sentiment, and she hoped fervently that he could not see her blush. "How are their burgers? Or the hot dogs? I'm thinking the foot-long hot dog, with chili and onions and cheddar, sounds very American."

She laughed at that, more amused than embarrassed at the stereotype. "I don't eat hot dogs very often, but I'm sure everything's good here."

He raised an eyebrow as he surveyed her figure. "No, you don't look as though you do."

"Have you been to America before?" she asked after they had ordered. "This isn't your first visit, is it?"

"No, I was in New York with my family for a week as a teen," he told her. "So I'd seen the city once before I moved here in September."

"But you've only ever been to New York, then," she said. He nodded. "New York is _nothing_ like the rest of America." Cora had come to love the city over the past year, but she continued to be struck by how very foreign it felt. "You must see more of the country while you're here. You haven't really been to America if you've only seen New York."

"Well, I don't imagine you've been anywhere in England besides London," he said, his eyes sparkling.

"No, but London seems so very English—"

He shook his head. "No more than New York is American. London doesn't compare with the moors and the dales and the villages I told you about on the way down here. You must see more of England, and I must see more of America."

She nodded, thinking of the romantic world he'd told her about on the subway, the world she pictured for _Jane Eyre_ and _Wuthering Heights_ and every British novel she'd ever read. He'd also told her, slowly and hesitantly, about his family estate, an old great house built in the seventeenth century on foundations that predated the Norman conquest. She had been enchanted to hear that it had been remodeled by the same man who had designed Parliament—how beautiful that sounded, and how architecturally interesting. And what wonderful artwork they must have inside! He had shamefacedly admitted that he could name few of their paintings, but he assured her that the estate did house a respectable collection.

"That's a very pretty ring," Robert said after a moment's pause, nodding at her hands, which were folded on the table in front of her.

"Oh, do you like it?" she asked, pleased that he would notice such a small detail. "Thank you. It's my high school ring."

"Your high school ring?"

"Do you not have those in England?" she asked, although it was clear from his confused expression that they did not. "In our junior or senior year of high school in America, we get to buy class rings," she explained. "It used to be that all the rings from a particular school looked exactly the same, but nowadays you have all sorts of choices for style and stone and color. You usually still have the name of your school and your graduation year engraved on it, though." She removed hers and passed it to him. "See, here's Sycamore High around the stone—the traditional design is to have the school name circle the stone, although not all rings are like that now—and then it says 2010 on the side."

"It's lovely," he said, examining it. "I knew high school, and graduation, was a bigger part of the culture here than it is in England, but I didn't know about the rings…or that you wear them for so many years afterward." He passed her ring back, and she replaced it on her finger.

"I'm not sure everyone does—in fact, I'm sure most people don't, as I don't see them very often on people my age. I think I'm just more sentimental than most…and the ring has a great deal of sentimental value to me. I worked for part of it, and my parents paid part…and it brings back so many happy memories of high school, and of my hometown," she said wistfully, thinking of her home now.

"Cincinnati," Robert said immediately.

"You remembered!" She smiled. "I didn't even think you knew where it was."

"I didn't." He grinned back. "But I think you said Ohio. I _had_ heard of that. What's in Cincinnati?"

"Well, it's nowhere near as magical as Yorkshire…"

"Nothing is, but we English make allowances for that," he said, his eyes twinkling again, and she smiled.

"We've got some wonderful art museums," she said, smiling anew at the way he smiled at her mention of art. "And the best ice cream in the world—Graeter's. They opened in the nineteenth century, and they still make all their ice cream by hand. It's creamy and dense and wonderful—you won't find anything else like it, anywhere."

"Ice cream is something of a thing with you, isn't it?" he said. "Oh—thank you," he added as the waiter delivered their food.

"Yes," she told him as her chicken was placed in front of her. "Although I'm so spoiled by Graeter's that I'm not sure I'll ever be fully satisfied with anything else! I do give the frozen hot chocolate here high marks, though." Cora paused, watching Robert carefully cut a small bite of his hot dog with his knife and fork, and she suppressed a giggle. "Do you ride?" she asked.

He glanced up, surprised at the change of subject. "Yes, of course. All my family ride. Why? Do you?"

She shook her head. "No, not unless you count pony rides at carnivals as a child. But I thought you might, since you're…English." She'd meant to say _an aristocrat_ and had caught herself at the last second, suspecting he was quite serious in not wanting her to think of him that way. "And if that's the case, what would mean the most to you about Cincinnati is that we're really not that far from the Kentucky Derby."

"Really!" His eyes widened with pleasure. "That isn't in Kentucky?"

"It is, but Kentucky borders Ohio. We're only about a hundred miles from Churchill Downs. It's quite a big deal in Cincinnati. I thought it might mean something to you."

"It does, it does," he said, nodding. "Have you ever seen the race?"

"No," she said, laughing softly. "No, I don't know the first thing about horses."

"I ought to see the Derby, while I'm here," Robert mused. "I may still be in America in May." Then his eyes met hers, nervously. "Perhaps…perhaps you would go with me, and you could show me your ice cream in Cincinnati?"

Cora felt herself blush, aware that he was announcing that he liked her well enough to think they'd be dating seven months on…and aware that she was not at all averse to the idea. "Perhaps," she said softly, dropping her eyes back to her chicken. "I think that might be very nice."

Dinner seemed to rush by in a moment as he asked her about her home and where in her country he ought to travel and what she liked best about New York, and before she could blink twice they were sharing one of Serendipity's massive trademark goblets of frozen hot chocolate, Robert exclaiming at the texture and the taste. She was immensely thankful that the goblets were so large as to be designed for two—and very grateful to the waiter for pointing this out to Robert so that she wouldn't have to—for there was something wonderfully romantic and intimate about leaning close over the same glass as they sipped through their straws. It might have been awkward on a first date with any other man she had just met, but it somehow seemed that she had known Robert for years, and sharing a drink with him seemed like the most natural thing in the world.

In far less time than she would have preferred, they had finished their dessert, Robert had paid the bill, and he was helping her into his coat again.

"Would it be all right if I walked you home?" he asked as she slipped her arms through the sleeves. "I understand if you're not comfortable with that, of course, and I can get my coat back from you later."

"I don't mind. That's very sweet." Cora knew she was disregarding one of the central tenets of safety advice in a first date with a man one did not know, but there was something so very sweet and gallant in the offer—especially with his acknowledgment that she might not want to accept—and she felt so very safe in Robert's presence. Safe and warm and comfortable… "But I'll text my roommate and check in with her, if you don't mind?" she added as an afterthought, trying to give the plan some semblance of caution.

He shook his head. "Of course not. Please."

She pulled her phone out of her purse and tapped a quick message to Felice— _Dinner with Robert Crawley. He's bringing me home—be there in 40 min. Story later. :-)_ —then tossed it back in, slinging her bag over her shoulder, just as she heard the _ding_ of Felice's response. Cora smiled to herself. She could well imagine her friend's shock.

"Ready?" Robert asked, and she nodded. He took her arm—she felt a sudden jolt at the contact—to guide her through the crowd that had gathered at the front of the restaurant as the evening had worn on, and she sighed softly with regret when he let her go as they stepped out onto the sidewalk. She would have to make do with his jacket, which she imagined felt rather like having his arms around her.

 _Cora!_ she reprimanded herself. _You barely know him!_ And indeed, she had always been slow in her relationships, not wanting to be touched, and certainly not kissed, for at least several dates. But there was something easy and comfortable about Robert that made her feel as though they had been out many times before and as though she had been fond of him for many years. It was the absolute last feeling she had expected to find with an English aristocrat.

"Where are we going, exactly?" he asked as they made their way back to the Lexington Avenue subway station.

"We're taking the 4 uptown to 149th," she told him, "and then we're catching a bus."

"Is nothing ever _direct_ for you?" he asked, chuckling, and she smiled again at the memory of their first meeting.

"Not much—only the 1 train." She sometimes thought the most annoying part of a student budget was that you were forced to live far away from everywhere you wanted to be, and your Metro stop only served a single line.

"And Lexington Avenue serves N, Q, R, F, 4, 5, and 6, but not 1."

"You know your trains very well for someone who hasn't been here long," she said approvingly. "Is it easier to memorize it when you've got the background of the London Tube?"

He laughed. "No, not at all. I've not memorized much of anything in New York—I still use my phone to get almost everywhere. I just know Lexington and 59th, because it's my stop."

"You _live_ around here?" She did not know if she was more surprised that he could afford this neighborhood—although _of course_ he could, she reminded herself—or that he had offered to spend over an hour winding through Manhattan and back when he could have walked home in five minutes. "Robert, you shouldn't come with me! There's no reason to drag yourself all the way to the tip of the island!"

"It's not dragging when it means I get to spend more time with you," he told her with a smile that made her legs feel slightly weak.

His comment, however, reminded her that her time with him was drawing short, and the subway ride and the bus trip seemed to fly by as she begged the minutes to slow. She would see him again, wouldn't she? She was keenly aware that he had no way of contacting her, but she did not want to be so forward as to thrust her phone number or email at him. Suppose he had no real interest in a second date? Cora had lost track of the men who'd seemed to enjoy an evening with her and then proceeded to drop off the face of the earth.

"It's not far from here," she said as they climbed off the bus half an hour later.

Robert nodded. "What's your roommate's name?"

"Felice—I'll introduce you when we get there. She's in the MFA program with me. She's quiet, but she's very sweet."

"That sounds very familiar," he said, and Cora was thankful the darkness would hide what must be her hundredth blush of the day. "I do envy her," he went on, and she looked up sharply.

"I'm sorry?" Was he being so forward as to imply he wished he were living with her?

"I envy Felice," he repeated with a grin. "She has what I don't—your phone number."

"Oh! Of course—I don't mind giving you my number. Of course not!"

"Because I'd very much like to see you again."

Cora let herself smile shyly, but what she wanted to do was shout with joy. "I'd like to see you again, too."

"Here." He gently took hold of her elbow, pulling her next to the high-rise they were passing so that they were not standing in the middle of the sidewalk. "I'll just let you put it in my mobile." He removed his phone from his pocket, tapped the screen a couple times, then passed it to her, the _New Contact_ window up. She typed _Cora Levinson_ and then added her phone number, feeling a warm relief slip over her as she touched the _Save_ button. Somehow, she knew Robert was going to call.

"Thank you," he said as she passed the device back, and then somehow the phone had been replaced in her hand by _his_ hand. Her heart jumped into her throat, but the gesture, and the surprise of it, made her bold enough to squeeze his hand in return, letting him know the contact was welcome.

And how wonderful it felt! His hand was warm, in spite of the crisp October air around them, and she could not help but think how _at home_ her own hand felt, as though it had always been meant to fit into his.

"Thank you for coming back with me," she said softly, breaking the comfortable silence that had fallen as they walked. "You've made it a much nicer trip."

" _You've_ made all of today much nicer," he said. "Thank you for the tour, and for joining me for dinner."

Cora was not much used to being thanked for dates—it seemed it should be the other way around, since he had paid. "Thank you _for_ dinner," she told him. "Did you enjoy the hot chocolate?"

"I did, and I'm glad you showed me that place—it's not very far from my apartment. I admit I haven't seen much of my neighborhood, or really New York, for that matter."

"Next t—" Horrified, she closed her mouth. She had no business suggesting a _next time_ when she had no guarantee he would even call her.

But he evidently intended to, because he seemed to find nothing odd in her words. "Next time, you'll have to show me another of your favorite places. Where's the best _hot_ hot chocolate? I don't imagine the weather's going to get any warmer for the next few months."

"I'll find us some," she promised, suddenly almost giddy at the embarrassingly romantic picture in her head of the two of them cuddled up in a cute café in a couple months, its interior all decorated for Christmas, as a light snow swirled on the streets.

They were soon climbing the steps to her and Felice's third floor apartment—she was somehow relieved that he didn't blink at the realization that of course it was a walk-up—when her front door opened ahead of her. She dropped Robert's hand, suddenly feeling like a teenager.

"Cora!" Felice exclaimed, sticking her head out. "I thought I heard you!"

No, she hadn't. Cora and Robert had not been speaking, and thus she knew all Felice could have heard were footsteps on the stairs, a relatively common sound. She strongly suspected that her roommate, who she imagined had been rather skittish at the idea of her walking home with an unknown man, had been popping out each time she'd heard a noise for the last half hour.

"Felice," she said with a smile, more grateful than irritated, "This is…this is…" How was she supposed to introduce him? Lord Crawley? Lord Robert? The man I met on the subway? Just Robert?

He settled the question for her. "I'm Robert," he said, continuing up the steps to shake Felice's hand. "Robert Crawley. Cora and I bumped into each other this afternoon, and—well, one thing led to another…"

"How nice," Felice said, but it was clear from her expression that she felt a lengthy story from Cora was due as soon as they were alone. "I'm her roommate. Felice Baxter."

Cora, who was standing behind Robert, gestured toward her friend to get back inside, _please_. She did not want to say her goodbyes to him with Felice looking on.

"Thank you for such a wonderful day, Robert," she said, and he turned back to her, giving Felice an opportunity to quietly close the door. "And thank you for your jacket." She took it off and passed it to him.

"I'm glad I met up with you at The Cloisters," he said, his voice soft and sincere. "I'd been hoping I'd see you again, but I'd decided that of course I wouldn't, because it's such a big city, but…" He trailed off, and she wondered if that wasn't a blush creeping into his own cheeks.

"I understand," she murmured, knowing that she'd been hoping they'd meet again just as much as he had.

He nodded. "I should be going. I'm sure you've got classes in the morning. I suppose I just go back the same way, and reverse the bus and the train?"

"Yes, and do be careful on your way to the bus stop. This isn't…it's just…" She wasn't quite sure how to phrase it. Her neighborhood wasn't terrible, and she never worried about walking its streets, but she didn't linger on them alone after dark, either.

Robert's brow furrowed. "Heavens, Cora, I'm glad I walked you home."

"Oh, I'm all right. I walk it every day. It's only…you're not used to it, and you'll look like you don't know where you're going, and…"

"I understand, and I'll be fine," he said, the worry not leaving his face. "But promise me you'll be careful here yourself." There was almost a plea in his voice, and she nodded.

They had inched closer together as they'd been talking, and for a moment, she thought he might kiss her. But he didn't, and truthfully, she was rather relieved—she knew she liked him a great deal, but she did not like to think of herself as the type to kiss on a first date.

Instead, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders in a half-embrace, burying his nose in her hair as he touched a feather-light kiss to the top of her head. _That_ was all right, and so very different from the kiss on the lips she'd been warily anticipating—this felt protective and sweet, and she was enveloped once again in that cozy feeling of safety.

"Good night, Cora," he said quietly, and she gave him a final smile as he turned to descend the stairs.

"Good night, Robert."


	5. Chapter 5

"Are sure you're warm enough, Cora?" Robert asked, rubbing his hand briskly up and down her back.

"Yes," she said, laughing softly. "Between you and all your blankets, yes. You're keeping me quite warm enough."

They were huddled on the curb of Central Park West, with the park across the avenue and a high-rise apartment building behind them, shortly after six o'clock on Thanksgiving morning. There was a fluffy blanket beneath them so that they didn't have to sit directly on the sidewalk, and Robert had brought scads of blankets—some of which Cora suspected he'd purchased just for today—to wrap around the two of them, especially her, for he'd quickly learned how often and how easily she was cold. And she might have been this morning, in spite of all the layers she was wearing—the sun had not yet risen, and the temperature was just above the freezing point—had it not been for the thick piles of heavy fabric Robert had made over her legs and around her shoulders. Then, of course, there were his arms, tucked around her under the covers, and his embrace made her warmer than any of the rest of it.

It had been six weeks since he and Cora had run into each other at The Cloisters, and those weeks had flown by in a rush of excitement. Their calendars had quickly filled themselves with dinners out and weekend sightseeing and lunch breaks in cafés near NYU or Robert's office and evenings in, curled up on Robert's couch sharing take-out. Cora knew she was falling hopelessly in love with him. She also knew she was powerless to do anything about it, despite an instinct she couldn't ignore that suggested he'd break her heart. She'd been unceremoniously dumped more than once, an experience always made more brutal by her own inability to love by halves. In any relationship, Cora gave her heart away entirely, and it was happening faster with Robert than with anyone she'd ever dated. Yet she knew he would be returning to England eventually, and he would certainly not be taking her with him. There would be a more suitable, well-born English girl to be his viscountess.

"Do let me know if you get too chilled," she heard Robert say now. "I don't want you to catch cold." He pressed a light kiss to her temple.

"You don't have to fuss, Robert," she said, although she secretly loved it when he fussed over her. "I'm fine. And I don't know what more you'll do about it if I _am_ cold!"

"I'll run to a store and buy another blanket. Or find a café and bring you some hot chocolate—is there anywhere around here we need to try so we can cross it off our list?" he asked, referring to their ongoing quest for the best hot chocolate in New York.

"I'm not drinking anything," she said, laughing. "We won't see a bathroom for another six hours."

"Then I'll just give you my coat if I have to," he said. "This was, after all, my idea."

She'd told Robert a couple weeks ago that she planned to stay in New York for the Thanksgiving holiday, and would he like to spend it with her? She'd make them a traditional turkey dinner with all the trimmings.

She had assumed he would accept, as he obviously wouldn't be going home to celebrate an American holiday, but what she hadn't counted on was how ecstatic Robert would be about the whole idea. "My first Thanksgiving!" he had exclaimed many times in the last two weeks, and he'd pestered her incessantly about the menu, checking to make sure that every dish he'd seen in a movie or read about online or heard mentioned by an American co-worker would be on the table.

But most of all, he'd been extremely eager to attend the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in person. "Of course we shouldn't just watch it on TV!" he'd exclaimed in horror when Cora, who was dreading the crowds, the hours of holding their spot, and the cold, had suggested this. "We're in _New York_! Why on earth would we watch it on a screen?"

She'd asked around at school and been told by those who had done it before that you could show up any time before the parade started at nine and stand somewhere in the back, which would be sufficient to see the floats and the balloons, and those were the main point of the parade in the first place. But that hadn't been good enough for Robert—he'd wanted a front row seat, right up by the barrier, and thus she'd drug herself out of bed at half past four in order to meet him outside the Columbus Circle subway stop at six. They'd walked a couple blocks north from there along the parade route—Robert looking rather like a pack mule with all of his blankets—where they'd easily found a spot right on the curb.

Cora, who was in the midst of the stressful last few weeks of her semester, had been less than thrilled about all of this, but now that she was here with him, she was rather glad they'd done it. She'd grown up watching the parade on TV every year, so to see it in person—from the very front row—would be an awesome experience…and she'd be sharing it with Robert, with whom she was so very comfortably cuddled up as they waited for the sun to rise and more crowds to gather.

"Do you not usually celebrate Thanksgiving with your family?" he asked. "I would have thought you would be going home to Ohio."

Cora shook her head. "My family doesn't stay in Ohio for Thanksgiving—we always went to L.A. to celebrate with my mother's extended family. I did that every year as a child, and then again in undergrad—when my parents were buying my plane tickets, and I was at Ohio State." She grinned. "But I didn't go last year after I moved to New York, and I decided I wouldn't go this year, either. It's incredibly expensive to fly all the way across the country for Thanksgiving weekend, and it's a six-hour flight—"

"Six hours to cross your country? You could almost be to London by then!" he exclaimed in surprise, and she laughed.

"Yes, I suppose you could. You also lose three hours on the way from California back to the East Coast, so it sucks up an entire day, not to mention several hundred dollars. So I haven't gone since I've been living here. Last year I took the train with Felice to her parents' house in Connecticut, but this year, since I knew you'd be here, I thought I'd spend it with you." She smiled shyly.

"I'm glad you did." He kissed her temple again. "I can't think of anyone else I'd rather spend my first American holiday with."

There was no reason, she told herself, that this sort of statement should still provoke butterflies in her stomach when she and Robert had been dating for a month and a half.

"Do you miss your family?" he went on. "Is it hard to spend Thanksgiving away?"

"It was last year, a bit," she said, twisting her class ring the way she often did when she was thinking. "Harder than I thought, because it just felt so strange not to do what I'd done on the holiday for twenty-two years. It's easier this time around because I've already broken the tradition once. And I'm not…I guess you could say I don't fit very easily with my mother's family. They're all very…well, they're very much like her, and she and I aren't very much alike."

"How so?" he asked.

"She's very…brash, perhaps. And loud. I love my mother, but…sometimes it's hard for us to be together very long. Or hard for me, I guess. I'm not sure my personality much bothers _her_. Oh, that sounds awful, doesn't it? I don't mean to make it sound as though I can't stand her. I do love her, and I do miss her now that I'm in New York."

Robert smiled. "I understand. My mother's a bit…difficult as well, and it's been something of a relief to be five time zones away and know that by the time my workday ends, she can't call me, because she's sleeping."

She laughed easily. "That's it! The word I was looking for—a relief. In some ways, it's a relief not to spend a long weekend cooped up in a house with my mother and her sister's family. I feel worse about leaving my dad to face it alone than I do about missing it!"

"Are you closer to your father?" he asked.

"Oh, absolutely." Cora nodded. "He's quiet, and calm, and easy to be with."

"You're like him, then. Especially that last part." Robert gave her shoulders a light squeeze, and she felt her heart melt again. "I'm closer to my father as well," he said after a moment. "He's much less…demanding than my mother."

"Are you homesick?" she asked. "Do you miss England?"

"Some days, yes," he admitted, and she was almost surprised, for he had not been here quite three months yet. "Not most of the time, because everything in New York is still so new and exciting, and I'm still thrilled to be working abroad. I've also met this American girl, and she's extremely distracting." She leaned up to brush a kiss to his cheek. "But sometimes, yes, I do miss England. Not so much London, but Yorkshire—being able to get away into the countryside. All the grass, and the moor. And the way people speak—it's a bit strange to go months and only hear your own accent when you call home or you catch a British show on TV. I sound odd to my own ears now."

"You sound wonderful to mine." She _loved_ the almost musical cadence of his accent. "I think your accent's really lovely."

"So is yours," he told her, and she laughed, for she didn't think she had an accent at all. "And I'll be going home soon enough—just for a visit," he said quickly, catching the distraught look on her face. "I'm going to Downton for Christmas next month, but I'll be back in New York after the first of the year. You're going home for Christmas, too, I assume?"

Cora smiled, well used to how easy it was for people to forget. "I am going home, then, yes, but we don't celebrate Christmas. I'm Jewish, remember?"

He didn't remember, not if the shock on his face were any indication. "You're Jewish?" he asked. "I didn't know that! You didn't tell me you were Jewish."

She supposed she hadn't…at least, she couldn't remember it having come up. But surely… "My last name," she said. "Didn't you think Levinson was Jewish?"

"I–I…it is, I guess. Yes, it is." Robert shook his head as though trying to clear it. "I just…I wasn't thinking about that. I didn't realize."

"You don't… _mind_ , do you?" she asked, suddenly worried at his reaction. Anti-Semitism had always seemed to Cora to belong to her grandparents' era, as she had never encountered anyone personally who had seemed to dislike her for her background. Robert did seem much more surprised than displeased, but…were English aristocrats really supposed to date American Jews?

"Heavens, no, Cora! No, I don't mind. Why would I? It just hadn't occurred to me; that's all. I suppose I thought it would have come up by now, but of course it hasn't. Have I offended you? I'm sorry—"

She shook her head. "No, of course you haven't. But to answer your question…yes, I do go home then, because I've got a long break from school. There's just no holiday to be celebrated when I get there—although this year it's rather nice, because Hanukkah actually starts on Christmas Eve and goes through New Year's, so I'll be home to celebrate. Although that's not a terribly big holiday in Judaism—it's not really the 'Jewish Christmas' people think it is.

"And please don't think I _mind_ Christmas. I actually like it a lot—embarrassingly a lot," she said, laughing. "I don't come from a particularly religious family, and I love the trees and the lights and the music. I want to have as much Christmas with you as possible before we both go home." She blushed as she said it, feeling the phrase was somehow rushing things, but it made Robert kiss her cheek.

"I think that sounds lovely," he said. "I'm just a bit sad the Hanukkah timing means I won't be lighting any candles with you."

The three hours before the parade passed quicker than she had thought they would—time with Robert always passed quicker than she'd expected—and soon they were laughing and cheering for Snoopy and Spiderman and Paddington Bear (the latter especially pleasing Robert) as the balloons sailed past. It was, Cora was amused to see, just like at home on TV…only right in front of her and larger than life and _real_ , and she delighted in pointing out the floats and balloons to Robert that had always been among her favorites. It struck her, suddenly, that being with Robert on Thanksgiving felt much like the parade: just like home, only somehow more _real_ …as though she was more at home with Robert than she had ever been in Cincinnati or L.A.

The parade ended shortly after eleven with the traditional arrival of Santa in his sleigh, ushering in the Christmas season, and Robert and Cora fought their way through the crowd for lunch at a nearby Italian café. They split up afterwards to return to their own apartments briefly, Cora wanting to shed all of her extra clothes and dress up a bit before going to Robert's to celebrate.

Her original plan had been to host him at her place, since Felice would be in Connecticut and she would have the apartment to herself, and they were so much more often in his home than hers, but this idea was quickly rejected on the basis that her tiny kitchen was not designed for the preparation of a full Thanksgiving dinner. Robert's apartment, of course, was spacious and gorgeous, its kitchen, with its double oven, the perfect place to cook the feast fit for kings that she intended for his first Thanksgiving. She'd spent hours and hours on many late nights reading recipes and calling her mother and making notes about each dish, and she meant for tonight's meal to be _perfect_.

* * *

"Finished?" Robert asked as Cora stepped out of the kitchen, untying her apron.

"For now," she said, smiling as she tossed it over the back of the couch. "I've got the turkey and the pumpkin pie in the oven, and I've prepared as many of the side dishes as I can—so much of it needs to be cooked at the end, so everything's hot. I'll go back in in an hour or so once the turkey's a bit closer."

"I can smell the pie," he said appreciatively. "At least, I assume that's the spices I smell."

She nodded happily. "Yes, that would be the cinnamon and the nutmeg mixed in with the pumpkin."

It had been nearly three o'clock by the time she had arrived at his apartment, lugging a bag full of groceries that she apparently intended to add to everything he'd already bought. She'd immediately begun prepping the turkey breast—she had talked him out of buying an entire turkey, telling him he'd have weeks of leftovers, and into a small breast instead—and he'd tried to be of as much assistance as possible. Yet it was quickly clear that he was more in the way than helpful, and he'd soon been evicted from his own kitchen.

He'd spent the last hour on his couch, watching an American football game—not so much because he had any interest in it, but because he understood that this was _what Americans did_ on Thanksgiving Day, and he was keen to observe the culture.

Cora now plopped down next to him, tucking her feet underneath her. "How's the game?"

"Umm…" Frankly, he had no idea how the game was. It seemed to him to involve a lot of wandering around between plays, with occasional team meetings thrown in. "The guys in purple are winning, I think," he said, taking a glance at the score.

"Robert!" she exclaimed, laughing at him. "You don't have a clue what's going on, do you?"

"I'm not convinced anything _is_ going on," he argued. "They've barely played."

"They barely do. I once read that the ball is only in play for eleven minutes in the average NFL game."

He turned to look at her, stunned. "Why do you _watch_ this, then? It's…it's a bunch of guys standing around, with commercials thrown in!"

" _I_ don't watch it," she said, laughing again. "I don't really watch sports much at all, but if I do, it's much more likely to be baseball than football. Moves much faster."

"Well, enough of this, then," he said, clicking the off button on his remote. If the American he was with didn't care about football, why was he wasting _his_ time? "If you've only got an hour before you have to cook again, I can think of much better ways to spend it." He reached out for her, and she moved immediately into his arms, kissing him warmly.

He savored the soft touch of her lips against his, the feel of her porcelain skin as he laid his hand against her cheek, the electrifying sensation of her hand in his hair. Then she sighed and pulled away, only to lay her head on his shoulder, her forehead tucked in the crook of his neck. They had spent several evenings curled up this way in the past month, but Robert still marveled at how having Cora in his arms, resting peacefully against him, was nearly as nice as kissing her…in some ways, even nicer. They fell into a comfortable silence, her head resting on his shoulder as he gently rubbed up and down her back, Cora brushing occasional kisses to his jawline, both of them basking in the smells coming from the kitchen. He could not get over how _soft_ she was, and how nice it felt to hold her, to have her body close to his. He kissed the top of her head, and she sighed again.

"I'm so glad you wanted to spend today together," he said quietly a few minutes later, only to be met with silence. "Cora?"

And then he realized she was asleep. He felt his face growing pink with pleasure at the thought that Cora felt comfortable enough and at home enough with him to drift off in his arms—nor could he think of many better ways to spend an afternoon than with her dozing against his chest.

The next thing he knew, he heard Cora shriek, "The _turkey_!"

What? He blinked his eyes open as the weight and warmth of her body left his side, and he slowly realized that he must have fallen asleep—as he often did on this couch. But of course Cora had been sleeping too, and, if the smoke coming from the kitchen, where she had darted after leaping off the couch, was any indication, they had slept long past the time when she would have needed to take the turkey and the pie out of the oven.

How late was it? He could see through the window that night had fallen, but the sun had been steadily sinking when Cora had first sat down next to him, so that wasn't much of a guide. He fervently hoped they had not slept so long that there had been damage to anything besides the food.

Nervously, he got up and followed his girlfriend into the kitchen, where he could hear the oven doors being flung open, the clanging of dishes as she removed things, and general cries of dismay. He found her staring down at a blackened circle that must have once been their pie. The turkey was sitting next to it in not nearly as bad of a state, but there were still copious charred spots on the bird's skin.

"It's ruined," she said, her voice unnaturally high.

"I wouldn't say ruined." Well, the _pie_ was, but… "I think the turkey's probably salvageable."

Cora shook her head, and he saw her eyes fill with tears. "No, I've ruined it. I've _ruined_ your first Thanksgiving."

Horrified and desperate that her tears should not fall, he hurried to her and pulled her into his arms as she started to cry. "Oh, darling. You haven't ruined anything."

"Y-yes, I have," she sobbed. "We–we won't have any p-pie, and you w-won't get to try pumpkin, and the–the turkey will be horribly dry, and…"

"Shh," he soothed, rubbing her back. He didn't want dinner nearly enough for it to be worth Cora crying. "It's all right, it's all right. We can put extra gravy on the turkey, and you've got so many other dishes that dessert doesn't matter. We'll go out to dinner tomorrow night if you like, and I'll order pumpkin pie, and I can try it then. It'll still be Thanksgiving weekend."

He felt her shake her head against his chest. "I j-just wanted your first Thanksgiving to be _p-perfect_ ," she said, crying harder now.

It was a shocking statement, because _perfect_ was precisely the adjective he would have used to describe the day, and it had nothing to do with tonight's meal. "It has been perfect!" he exclaimed, but she shook her head. "It _has_!" he insisted. "It's perfect because I got to spend it with you. You could heat a can of soup on the stove for Thanksgiving dinner, and I'd still be happy because I was with you. Darling, I _love_ you." In his haste to reassure and comfort her, the words flew out of his mouth, but he realized as he said them that he had never spoken them before. Cora stiffened and pulled back slightly to look up at him, and he held his breath. Had it been unwelcome?

But then she smiled through her tears. "Do you?" she asked shakily. "Do you really?"

"Of course I do," he said, feeling the certainty as he said it. He smiled down at her, but her own smile faltered as she sniffed again.

He guided her to the bar stools next to his kitchen island, helping her up onto one and then pulling the other stool close before climbing on himself. "Cora, you're doing a beautiful job with dinner," he said, taking her hands in his. "You're trying to get every American dish imaginable onto my table, and it's all going to be wonderful because you're the one making it. I don't care if the turkey's a bit overcooked. I'll even eat that whole pie if it will make you feel better."

She managed a laugh that was still partly a sob. "I don't want either of us to eat that pie. And I'm sorry about all of this." She pulled one hand back to wipe her eyes, then replaced it in his. "I just hate myself for messing up two of the most important dishes, and all because I fell asleep because I wasn't paying enough attention."

"No, you fell asleep because you were exhausted," he corrected. He did not know how he had missed it before—perhaps he had been too wrapped up in his own excitement for the day—but now that he was examining Cora at such close range, he could easily see the dark smudges under her eyes. "I think you've been up late for days, because the end of your semester is coming and you're trying to finish all your projects, and because you were dealing with figuring out everything you were cooking and how you would bring it all off this afternoon, and then you got up in the middle of the night to go watch the parade with me. You've been running all day, and so the minute you sat down, of course you fell asleep."

She nodded, wiping her eyes again, and he felt a pang of guilt at the confirmation that, yes, that had been her week, and he had unintentionally made it much more stressful. "Yes, I'm just…I'm sorry I messed this up."

"Hush," he said. "Don't apologize. You've done a wonderful job."

"You're not disappointed about the pie and the turkey?"

"Sweetheart, _no_ ," he said, taking her in his arms again. "I'm not the least bit disappointed in a day I've spent with you." She snuggled close to him, and he kissed her temple. "Shall we move back to the couch? I think you could do with a bit more of a nap."

"No," she said, pulling away and sitting up. "Not now; it's six o'clock. I've got to get everything else finished, or we'll be eating in the middle of the night."

"Doesn't everything just have to go in the oven?"

"Well, the green bean casserole, yes, and the rolls, yes, and the corn needs to be warmed in the microwave at the last minute. But the potatoes need to be cooked on the stove and then mashed, and the stuffing needs to be mixed and cooked on the stove." Her eyes were growing wide, and he saw her twist her ring, as though stressed at the thought of everything she still had to do.

He spied the stuffing in a box on the counter, which implied it came with instructions, and none of the rest of that sounded difficult. "Have you got all the cooking times and such written down somewhere?"

"Yes, my notes are by the stuffing, but—"

"Then that settles it, sweetheart. You go lie down, and I'll finish everything." Ignoring her protests, he guided her back to the front room, found her a throw pillow, and covered her with one of the blankets they had used that morning. Cora's eyes closed immediately, and he brushed a light kiss to her hair before heading back into the kitchen, his phone in his hand as he typed, "how to salvage burned turkey," into the search box.


	6. Chapter 6

December came fast on the heels of Thanksgiving, and Robert and Cora spent much of it in each other's arms. Christmas was the city's most romantic time, and they took in nearly all of what New York had to offer during the season. They watched the tree lighting at Rockefeller Center, they strolled down Fifth Avenue and gazed at its elaborate window displays, Robert took Cora to see the Rockettes, and there was a perfect Saturday afternoon spent ice skating in Central Park as a light snow fell. It was followed with two cups of hot chocolate at Jacques Torres—which they both agreed was the best they'd had—a dinner of Italian, and a shopping trip, Cora having given in to Robert's pleas for them to go buy a menorah, take it back to his flat, and pretend that Hanukkah fell earlier this year so that he might celebrate with her for a night.

He was surprised—and a bit alarmed—when their last date before his visit home for Christmas arrived, and he realized he preferred New York with Cora to a trip back to England. He longed to stay here with her, and he could not quite figure when that had happened, as he didn't like the city any more than he ever had. It was only the knowledge that she herself would be returning to Ohio for a couple weeks that convinced him to board his plane. He would see her in January, he told himself as the lights of JFK Airport grew smaller and smaller. And January was not so far away.

"I ought to go," Cora said softly. Yet she did not move an inch and remained half-draped across his chest. This was the way their evenings always ended—one of them would suggest that it was late and that they ought to go home and sleep, and a good half hour would pass before any movement was made.

Tonight, of course, he imagined would be much worse, as it was only the second time they'd seen each other since their respective returns to New York. He'd taken her out for dinner and then suggested they go back to his apartment, where they could talk in much quieter surroundings, but of course they both knew the real motivation was to spend the rest of the evening snuggled together on his couch.

They had been together for nearly three months now, but Robert had not yet slept with Cora. While he was not the type to rush into bed with every woman he had dinner with, he had certainly slept with his few serious girlfriends before the three-month mark. The irony, he thought, was that he considered his relationship with Cora to be far more serious than any he had ever had before.

He sensed, though, without any outright discussion of the matter, that Cora did not want to sleep with him—at least not now, or not yet. He was not sure whether she was the sort of girl who waited for marriage, or at least an engagement ring, or whether she was just a slower mover than any of his previous girlfriends, but he did not want to push her into anything she did not want. He cared for her far too much—and enjoyed being with her far too much—to risk that. Nor did he much mind all the opportunities he had merely to hold her and kiss her instead—she was so wonderfully soft, so wonderfully warm, so wonderfully _perfect_ in his arms.

"Not just yet," he protested in response to her mention of leaving, as though she'd started for the door. "Don't go yet."

"We've both got to get up in the morning."

"I'll make it worth your while to stay," he said. He laid his fingers under her chin, gently tilting her face upward so that he could kiss her warmly, his lips dancing against hers. His tongue pushed in lightly to brush against her own, teasing her, and then he pulled back, smiling at the soft whine she gave at the abrupt end.

"All right, that gets you another fifteen minutes if we can finish that," she said, laughing and wrapping her arms around his neck, pulling him closer to kiss her again.

Robert felt the vibration in his pants pocket before he heard it: the unmistakable popping of a call over Facebook Messenger.

Cora's lips paused, and she pulled back. "What is that?"

"It's my phone. Ignore it," he said, trying to kiss her again, but she frowned.

"That's not your ringtone."

"It sounds different because it's a call over Messenger. I use it for calls to England because they're free that way. But whoever it is can just send a message—"

"If they're calling from England, Robert, I think you ought to answer it. It's, what, three in the morning over there? It might be important."

He sighed, suspecting that Cora was now far too interested in his international call to go on kissing him, and she did have a point about the odd hour.

"Oh, it's my _sister_ ," he groaned, glancing at the screen as he pulled the phone out of his pocket. A middle of the night phone call from Rosamund was never a good thing. "This is probably a drunk dial."

Cora giggled, and he touched the answer button. "Hello?"

"Oh, Robert, I was afraid you wouldn't pick _up_ ," Rosamund said, her voice cracking on the last word. He heard her choke back a sob.

He sighed. "How much have you had to drink tonight, Roz?" She wasn't usually a maudlin drunk, but he'd seen it happen before.

"I h-haven't been drinking," she said. "It's…it's…"

He'd heard his sister drunkenly claim she hadn't touched a drop one too many times. "Yes, you have. You need to go straight home if you're not there already, and then get yourself to bed. Is Duke with you? Is he sober?"

"Robert, will you please _listen_?" she snapped through her tears, and something in her voice frightened him. "I'm not _drunk_! This isn't about _me_! It's—it's— _Father_ …" She started crying in earnest at that, and Robert heard the murmur of another voice in the background.

"What? What's wrong with Father?" he demanded, but there was no answer, just a rustling noise. "Rosamund?"

"Robert, this is Duke," he heard his brother-in-law's voice say a second later. Rosamund's sobs were still audible, but they were distant now, her husband apparently having taken her phone from her. "Roz and I are at Downton. Your father…he had a massive heart attack earlier tonight. He was airlifted to York, but…there wasn't anything they could do."

"What?" he said, almost stupidly. The information was so foreign that he could not quite comprehend it.

"I'm sorry," Duke said. "He passed away a few hours ago."

"He–he couldn't have. He wouldn't have had a heart attack. He…he didn't have heart problems. He wasn't sick," he argued, as though trying to convince his brother-in-law that they had somehow confused Patrick Crawley with another man in his late fifties.

"No, he wasn't," Duke said quietly. "It was very sudden, and it's come as a shock to all of us."

"But–but he wasn't even sixty. This…this can't be right." And it couldn't be. He'd just seen his father a week ago, and the earl had been the picture of health, laughing and talking and tromping around in the woods for the New Year's shoot.

"I'm sorry," Duke repeated. "I'm afraid it's true. Can you…your mother wants you to come for the funeral. Can you fly back over? She says we can wait several days if we need to for you to figure out your flights."

"I–I'll leave tomorrow," he stammered. Of course he'd be there for the funeral. He'd leave for the airport this second, if he thought there was any hope of a flight yet tonight. "Tell Rosamund I'll send her my flight details as soon as it's booked…and give her and my mother my love."

They said goodbye, and Robert touched his screen to end the call, realizing as he did so that his hands were shaking.

"Robert," Cora breathed, and he looked up, startled. He'd almost forgotten she was there, but how reassuring it was to look into her face!

"My father's dead," he said bluntly, the words tasting strange and sharp in his mouth.

"I know," she said quietly, and he realized his own end of the conversation must have made the situation clear enough. "Would you like me to go? So that you can be alone?"

"God, no! No, the last thing I want is for you to leave. Please…" He stopped, feeling his eyes filling, and slowly, gently, Cora tugged one of his hands off the phone he was still gripping.

"Darling," she murmured, wrapping his hand in both of her small ones. He willed himself not to cry, turning his tears inward, his eyes closed, and then he felt Cora pull one of her hands back and then mold her body against his, wrapping her free arm around his shoulders and pressing a soft kiss against his neck. "Shh."

 _Was_ he weeping? Weeping audibly? His thoughts were spinning too fast for him to be sure. His father was dead. The very alive man he'd just seen was dead. A massive heart attack. His father was dead. They'd wait for him for the funeral. His father was dead. He needed to get a flight. His father was dead. The earl—oh, God, _he_ was the earl now…

"Shh," Cora murmured again, and he felt her brush another kiss to his neck, her hand running through his hair. He prayed she would not let him go, for her warmth against his body and her firm grip on his hand were all that was anchoring him, all that was holding him in place, reminding him where and who he was.

Slowly, he began to feel he could breathe again, and he heard Cora say softly, "Baby, we need to get you a flight."

"I—I don't…I…I think…" He was babbling, suddenly at a loss as to what he was meant to do.

He felt her hand rubbing up and down his back, and he tried to concentrate on the soothing sensation of her fingers and ignore the whirling in his mind. "Come, let's figure out how you're getting to England. Where's your computer?"

"On the kitchen counter," he said, immensely relieved that someone else would deal with this. She kissed his temple and then darted into the kitchen, returning with his MacBook.

"Do you want to leave tomorrow?" she asked quietly as she settled back onto the couch.

"Yes, tomorrow. If there's a seat…I'm sure there's a seat with someone."

"One way, or do you know how long you'll need to stay?"

"One way, I think." He couldn't think straight enough to fathom anything beyond getting there. He was leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, staring down at the blank phone screen in his hands as though he could change the conversation he had just had with the Painswicks, but he was vaguely aware of Cora typing next to him as she searched for flights.

"It's quite expensive, of course," she said after a moment. Yes, he'd expected that. "It's about $1500 to fly one-way to London tomorrow with any of the major carriers." He knew in some distant part of himself that he should be troubled at the thought of paying three times the usual price for a one-way transatlantic flight from New York, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

"If you want to get there as soon as possible," Cora went on, "there's actually a daytime flight with Delta…it leaves here at 8:15 tomorrow morning and lands at Heathrow at 8:15 in the evening."

"That one. I'll take that one." He'd much rather be home tomorrow night than not land until the following morning.

"Wait," Cora said, scrolling down as he took his credit card from his wallet, "you could actually do this much cheaper on Icelandair. You have to fly overnight, and you have to connect in Reykjavik, so you don't get to London until noon the next day, but it's only $900."

As much as he wanted the option where he flew out ten short hours from now, he knew that the loss of a night and a morning in England was well worth the savings, and he also realized that he would be better served to have a day in the office to organize matters as best he could before jetting off for at least a week. "What time does the flight to Reykjavik leave?"

"8:40 tomorrow night, from JFK."

"Book that, please." He passed her his credit card and was seized with a sudden desire, as he watched her type, to bring Cora with him.

This was, of course, a completely impractical plan. To begin with, Robert's family—or, more to the point, Robert's _mother_ , for he imagined Rosamund had picked some of it up over Facebook—did not know Cora even existed. He had never been one to shout from the rooftops about his romances, and he had learned early on that his mother especially was best left in the dark about such matters. This relationship had been even easier than most to keep out of her view, given how far he now was from England.

His mother also would not be pleased when she _did_ find out about Cora. Violet Crawley had distinct ideas about the sort of girls Robert should date and someday marry, and he was well aware that "middle class, Jewish American artist" was not at the top of her list. If things continued going as well as they were with Cora, he knew he would at some point have to introduce her to his mother, but immediately on the heels of Violet's husband's death hardly seemed the time. Nor did he think that his father's funeral was the best occasion on which to introduce a new girlfriend to his family anyway.

No, he absolutely could not bring Cora to England with him. He watched as she filled out his information, and eventually she murmured, "Your boarding pass is printing…are you going to work tomorrow?"

"Yes, I don't think I have much choice. I want to get as much possible done before I leave the country again for another long trip."

She nodded. "I was going to tell you not to, but I think you're probably right. You need to pack now, then, so you can go straight to the airport after work."

Yes, of course. He hadn't thought that far ahead.

"Do you want me to go so you can think about what you're taking, and get your bag ready?"

"Stay, please," he said. "It won't take me long—I'm not taking much. I'll go by my flat in London when I get there for a suit for the funeral, and for anything else I need. Do you mind? I know you need to get home—"

Cora shook her head. "I don't mind," she said softly. "I don't mind at all."

He knew he was stalling—of course Cora would have to leave eventually. Probably as soon as his bag was packed, for what else was there to do at that point than go to bed? It was already quite late. But he was desperate to have her there as long as possible, for as long as he was in her gentle presence, he knew the world had not ended.

She followed him into his bedroom, perching on his bed as he haphazardly tossed clothes into a duffel bag. He was too distracted to pack properly, and he suspected he'd arrive without some crucial item…but he could pick it up at his own flat as he'd said to Cora, or buy a replacement in Yorkshire.

The task was finished far sooner than he would have preferred, and he turned back to Cora. "You really ought to get home," he said. "And I should go to bed." Not that he thought he would sleep at all. She stood, and he went to embrace her, intending to kiss her and then let her go…but he couldn't. He breathed in her scent, his nose buried in her hair, and he suddenly found he couldn't exhale.

"Breathe," he heard her say quietly, and he managed two shuddering breaths. "Breathe, Robert."

"Oh, _God_ , Cora," he finally managed, feeling something breaking inside of him.

"Oh, my darling," she whispered, her arms tightening around him, and he heard her own voice crack. She nudged him toward the bed and eased them both onto it. After holding him for a long moment, she pulled back to look at him, her hand resting against his cheek and the blue in her eyes deeper with her sympathy.

"Darling, would you like me to lie down with you?" she whispered. "Would it be easier for you to sleep if I stayed the night?"

A thousand times yes. _Infinitely_ yes! But…was she all right with that? "Are you sure that's okay with you?"

Cora smiled softly. "I suggested it, didn't I? I don't want to leave you alone tonight. I'll worry if I go."

"You're sure?" he asked again, desperately wanting her with him but afraid for her to regret it.

She nodded. "I don't mind sleeping next to you." He heard an ever-so-slight emphasis on the word _sleeping_ , as though to make it clear that was all she was offering, and he knew he'd been reading her correctly for the last three months.

He embraced her again, kissing her forehead and feeling the relief in his body at the thought that they were not to be separated just yet. "Thank you, sweetheart," he whispered.

"Do you want something of mine to sleep in?" he asked when they broke apart. She had not dressed terribly formally for dinner—just nice pants and a form-fitting sweater, along with the diamond stud earrings he had given her for Hanukkah—but he suspected it would not be very comfortable for overnight. "The bottom drawer of the chest has several sweatshirts that might fit you as nightdresses."

She nodded, and he left her to change while he prepared for bed in his bathroom. When he returned, he found her sitting at the end of his bed in a gray Oxford University sweatshirt. Although Cora was tall, she was so thin he sometimes suspected he could circle her waist entirely with both hands, and the shirt was comfortably tent-like on her, hanging down almost halfway to her knees.

He was struck most of all, however, by how natural she looked, as though she belonged in his home.

"Which side is yours?" she asked, breaking the spell.

"I usually sleep on the left," he said. "Is the right all right with you?"

"Of course it's all right," she said, laughing softly. "It isn't my bed, and I'm used to a single anyway." She climbed in, and he joined her after flicking off the light.

He had thought there would be something awkward in lying in bed with Cora, but he knew immediately that nothing had ever felt more natural. He was stretched out on his back, and she cuddled up to him, her hand resting on his chest.

"Is this okay?" she whispered. "Do you need more space?"

The absolute last thing he wanted was _space_ from Cora Levinson. "It's more than okay," he said, shifting to free his left arm and wrap it around her shoulders. "This is _wonderful_."

But if he'd had any idea that he might focus on the romantic feeling of his girlfriend in his arms, that thought was quickly quashed. His worries and fears and grief seemed to be gathering above him in the darkness, and it was quickly becoming apparent that he could not have lain here alone without drowning. Had she not been here, he would have gotten up and watched television all night, he would have gotten up and read a book, he certainly could not have…

"Sleep, darling," he heard Cora's voice say sweetly. "Sleep." Her hand was rubbing light, gentle patterns over his chest and stomach, and he realized that its position near his heart meant that she felt every change in his emotions. He closed his eyes and tried to rest, tried to relax into her caress, but his memories of his last visit home were swirling through his mind, and he could feel tears forming.

"I'm sorry," he choked, feeling them trickle past his closed eyelids. Sorry for his tears. Sorry for keeping her up. Sorry that she was witnessing him lying in bed, weeping weakly.

"Oh, Robert, don't be sorry." He felt her prop herself up, and then her lips were against his damp cheek. Her hand was stroking his forehead and passing gently through his hair. "Just be still and rest as best you can."

"It's just…" Shocking? Horrible? A nightmare? He had no adequate words, and he felt her kiss him again.

"Shh, darling. I'm right here."

Oh, how glad he was of that! He reached up to wrap both arms around her, pulling her down against him so that he could hold her, weeping into her chocolate curls, clinging to Cora as a child might cling to its teddy bear.


	7. Chapter 7

AN: This one's quite a bit shorter than the previous chapters, but I thought it should stand alone...and I think you'll see why! ;-)

Also, a couple people have raised questions in reviews and PMs about both Robert's and Cora's financial statuses, which probably means that even more people are wondering and just haven't asked. :-) Since both situations are different from the traditional narrative, it's probably worth just stating it here rather than leaving you to guess at it.

The Crawleys are not broke and in desperate need of cash. When Robert next goes to England, he will discover that the accounts are not quite as sound as he had hoped, but it's not the disaster of the 1880s in canon. There's enough family money to mostly support the Abbey. The money that is funding Robert's daily life is his own money from his lucrative job, not the Crawley fortune, which is largely tied up in Downton. His salary doesn't exactly mean he has unlimited funds, and thus he's much more aware of spending money than canon Robert, but he's doing very well.

The Levinsons in this AU are average, middle or upper-middle class people. Cora grew up comfortable but not rich, and thus her parents can't fund her graduate studies in New York. Therefore, she personally is broke because she's living on savings, the tiny stipend she gets as a graduate assistant, and the smallest student loans she can get by with.

* * *

Robert stared numbly out the window of his taxi as it crossed the bridge into Manhattan. It was only a quarter past five in New York, but that meant it was after ten in England, and he'd left his flat before six that morning for another double hop, spending the last sixteen hours rushing through airports and waiting in security and customs lines and crouching in tiny plane seats. When he'd landed two hours earlier, he'd texted Cora asking if they could meet for dinner. It was long past the dinner hour as far as his body was concerned, but Robert was starving. He had not considered the "chicken"—or so the flight attendant had claimed it was—that he'd been given on the plane hours ago to be anything approaching an edible meal. Cora had agreed but had protested that he was likely far too tired to drag himself to a restaurant, suggesting instead that she head for his apartment, let herself in, and start making dinner so that it would be ready by the time he arrived.

He had gratefully agreed, and now he was almost there. He was not so much _excited_ to see Cora, feeling far too drained by his journey and the last ten days in Yorkshire for such an emotion. He preferred to say that he longed for her, that he ached for her presence and her warmth and the sound of her voice.

For Robert had been both right and wrong in his decision—never mentioned to her—not to bring Cora to England with him. Right because his family had been the awkward, strained mess he had expected it to be after his father's sudden death, and interjecting his new American girlfriend into the midst of it would have been the worst possible idea. But also wrong, very wrong, because how terribly he had needed her! How many times he had almost reached for her hand, how many times he had thought of her face, how many times he had hungered to feel her arms around him again.

The time difference, the knowledge that she would be hard at work in her studio most days until he himself was in bed, and the constant presence of his relatives had made it difficult to speak with her from England, but he'd called her once over Messenger, just after the funeral luncheon, when he'd escaped onto one of the estate's walking trails, trying to catch his breath and swallow the tears that had been threatening all morning.

"Are you all right?" she'd asked when she'd picked up, trepidation in her voice at a call from overseas.

"Yes," he'd said, making the immediate decision that he was, or at least that he would be. "I just…this morning…" His mouth had gone dry, unable to tell her that they'd had the funeral, that they'd buried his father.

"Darling," she murmured softly, and he knew that she knew.

"I just wanted to hear your voice," he said shyly, as though he were asking for an expensive gift. "So could you just…talk to me? About anything?"

She was getting dressed and ready to head for NYU, she'd said, and she told him what she planned to work on that day, and what she'd done the day before, and what she and Felice had made for dinner last night, and what she was wearing today, and he'd listened, not to her words but to her voice, letting its softness soothe him as he forced himself to keep breathing.

Yorkshire had been cold and wet and gray and miserable throughout his visit, the weather perfectly matching the Crawley family's mood. He'd arrived to find his mother drawing in to herself, her own grief quiet and private and cloaking her in silence—except for the many times she'd told him he must return to England permanently soon, for the estate was now his to manage and deal with. Poring over the papers and financial books now had made him feel like a vulture, and so Robert had agreed to return to England next month to sort through everything.

"And you can move back shortly after that," his mother had said when he'd told her he'd booked a ticket for late February. "Your assignment is up in March, I believe."

It was, but he hadn't answered her directly, for he had planned to sign on for another six months so that he might have more time to get to know Cora. He knew it was still early days yet, and he was not ready to make any sort of commitment or promises, but he admitted to himself that he was beginning to think of a future with her. He wanted another half a year in the same city, and then perhaps they'd both be sure.

He heard the soft _ding_ of another text message as his taxi exited the bridge, and he took his phone out of his pocket. It was Cora, and he smiled at the thought that she could sense his arrival on the island. _So glad you're almost home, baby,_ her text read.

 _Home._ What an odd thing to call this place, he thought, as he looked out at the mess of an urban jungle springing up around his cab. New York was not home, and he could not imagine how it ever could be. He wanted more time here—something that would have shocked him last September—but not out of any great affection for the city. He didn't think he'd ever grow any more than begrudgingly tolerant of its filth and traffic and chaos and noise.

 _I've just_ left _home,_ he thought, but he was uncomfortably aware that Yorkshire wasn't home anymore, either. The last time he had truly lived there had been the summer after his second year at Oxford. His time at Downton last week could not have felt less like home, the suddenly silent mansion haunted with shadows of happier times. Nor was his flat in London home now. Several months away had made it feel much more distant than he'd expected, and sleeping there last night, with all of his most important possessions having been shipped to New York in August, had made him feel like a guest in someone else's apartment.

Cora's text made him feel oddly bereft, almost homeless, and he frowned. He slipped the phone back into his pocket without answering. He arrived at his apartment building a few minutes later, paid his cab driver, and made his way inside in a jet-lagged daze, nodding to the doorman, stepping into the elevator, and dragging his bag the last few feet to his door. He fumbled for his keys before he remembered that of course it was unlocked—Cora was already here—and he let himself in, dropping the bag by the door. He'd deal with unpacking tomorrow.

He could smell some combination of meat and spices, a delicious scent that he could not quite identify, but he didn't care what they'd be eating. For as the door clicked shut behind him, he heard Cora's gentle accent call out, "Robert? Are you home?"

"It's me," he responded, dodging her question, for neither this, nor any of the places he'd been all week, were home. "I'm here."

He followed the scent and the sound of her voice into the kitchen…and there she was, standing at his stove, stirring a steaming pot. Dressed casually in jeans and an Ohio State hoodie, but far more beautiful than he could have remembered, a soft smile on her lips.

"Hey," she said quietly. "It's good to see you."

It was so much more than just _good_ to see her. He didn't trust himself to speak, coming instead to embrace her. She brushed a kiss to his jawline as he pressed one against her temple, and they held on, Cora's arms wrapping tightly around him and her hands rubbing gentle patterns on his back as he breathed in the scent of her hair, steadying himself, calm and comforted for the first time in days.

"I'm glad you're home," she whispered. "Are you okay?"

He was, for he had just realized two things.

First, that _this_ was home. Not Downton or London, and certainly not New York, but _Cora_. He was home when he was in her arms. He was home now.

And second, that he must marry this woman.


	8. Chapter 8

Cora awoke on a Monday morning at the beginning of February at the noise of Felice in the shower. She was used to waking at the sound of the running water, as their bathroom was right next to her bedroom, and then rolling over to sleep for another hour or so—her roommate had always been the earlier riser, getting up first, getting to NYU long before Cora, and then finishing earlier in the afternoons.

Today, however, the prospect of moving at all was an unattractive one, for she'd awakened to a sharp burning in her legs and her back. It had snowed last week, and she and Robert had spent all of yesterday at a ski resort a couple hours away in Pennsylvania. The day had been fun and romantic and exciting, and the resort had been a perfect winter wonderland, but she'd suspected by evening that she'd rather overdone it—a suspicion that was very much confirmed this morning.

Cora closed her eyes again, trying to ignore the ache in the lower half of her body, but it was soon clear that she would not be drifting off to sleep again. She sighed and reached for the phone on her bedside table, groaning at the pull in her muscles when she moved.

As she'd expected, there was a text from Robert—once he'd learned she left her phone on silent while she slept, he'd gotten in the habit of texting her first thing each morning when he woke up, a text she usually found an hour or so later.

 _Good morning, beautiful,_ her phone screen read. _How are YOU feeling?_ She giggled at the implication that his body was just as annoyed as hers was.

 _Sore,_ she texted back, _but still happy about yesterday._

A moment later, a reply of, _Me too, on both counts,_ flashed across her screen. A few more seconds, and he had added, _You look even prettier when you have snow in your hair._ She smiled, feeling his words warm her, and texted back a "thanks" and a heart.

Cora sighed contentedly, drawing the covers tighter. She was happy enough to lie here and think of Robert, her sore legs a reminder of a very lovely day spent with him. She often felt as though he had his arms around her when she woke in the mornings, for she slept every night in the Oxford sweatshirt he'd lent her when she'd stayed over at his apartment. She'd shyly asked the next morning if she might keep it while he was away, not knowing how long he would be gone and wanting something to remind her of him. He'd agreed immediately, and she had conveniently forgotten to give it back when he'd returned. Its warmth reminded her of his arms, and, although it might have been her imagination after all the time it had now spent on her, she thought it still had Robert's scent.

The idea of sleeping in Robert's arms on a regular basis was a very happy one, except for the fact that she knew this would involve more than simply _sleeping_. Cora suspected she was unusual among the girls in her program in that she was still a virgin, and quite content to be so. She was not necessarily saving herself for her wedding night, but the prospect of a long string of serial love affairs leading up to her marriage did not interest her. She intended to give herself to one man, and one man only, and thus intimacy for her entailed, if not an engagement, then at least a very strong certainty that she had found the man she would marry. She was beginning to think Robert might be that man—she certainly loved him very much—but she felt she needed more time to be sure, and of course she had no idea whether he was envisioning a life with her the way she was with him. He had certainly not said anything of the sort. Sometimes she worried that she was merely a momentary amusement for him during his time in America, and he would forget her as soon as he moved back to England, finding someone more appropriate to be his viscountess. It did speak well of him, though, that he had not appeared to be troubled at her disinterest in sleeping with him. She'd lost boyfriends over that before.

Cora lounged in bed for a bit, listening to the sounds of Felice's shower and then her hair dryer. She felt a bit sorry for her roommate at the moment—Felice had dropped her iPhone last week, cracking the screen to the point that her texts and emails were barely legible. She'd learned that it would require a $200 repair, and she'd been stressed over where she would come up with the money.

Eventually, Cora heard the other girl leave the bathroom, and she dragged herself out of bed, wincing and feeling like an old woman. It was still earlier than she usually got up, but she figured she might as well dress and go in, and she was looking forward to a hot shower anyway.

When she stepped into the bathroom, she paused at the mirror to run her brush through her hair and was hit with an uneasy feeling. Something was…wrong here, wasn't it? She could not put her finger on it, but something about the sink seemed off.

 _It's a bathroom sink,_ she told herself. _There wouldn't be anything wrong with it._ She shook her head to clear it, undressed, and climbed into the shower, telling herself she was merely tired after a late night with Robert.

It was easy to forget a passing moment of strangeness as she let the welcome heat of the water soothe her sore muscles, and soon Cora was dressed and putting the finishing touches on her make-up. After applying her mascara, she reached for her watch, fastening it around her left wrist. And then she realized what was wrong.

Her ring. Her high school ring was missing.

She hurt too much to bend, but Cora glanced down, running over every bit of the tile floor with her eyes, sure she or Felice had simply knocked it off the sink. But it was a small bathroom, there was virtually nowhere for the ring to roll, and she couldn't see it anywhere.

She always took it off and set it on the sink when she got ready for bed in the evenings, but perhaps she hadn't last night? Perhaps she'd left it in her room? No, she remembered setting it in here. She knew she'd worn it skiing yesterday, and then she knew she'd taken it off in the bathroom.

Had it somehow fallen into the sink unnoticed and slipped down the drain while she or Felice had been brushing their teeth? No, that was ridiculous. It was a sizeable piece of jewelry; a person wouldn't accidentally rinse it down the sink.

Cora tried to swallow her growing panic. _It_ has _to be here,_ she told herself. _Rings don't just walk away. You've moved it and forgotten about it._

She left for NYU, promising herself a more thorough search that evening. But as the day wore on, she couldn't ignore the suspicions playing at the back of her mind. For Cora knew she hadn't moved the ring herself, and the only person who had been in the bathroom between her removal of the ring last night and her shower this morning had been her roommate. There would have been no reason for Felice to move it, so…had she _taken_ it?

 _She wouldn't steal from you,_ Cora tried to tell herself. And truthfully, she could not imagine her best friend stealing something of such great sentimental worth, something she'd meant to keep all her life, to fix the screen of a phone that Felice would replace in a year or two anyway. She loved Felice, and she believed that feeling was mutual.

 _Maybe Felice just moved it, and there's a simple explanation._ Yet she could not think what that explanation might be, and she could not help but consider the coincidence that her roommate—who did have a conviction for theft on her record—had needed money, and then an expensive ring had gone missing. Cora hated herself for thinking it, but it made an uncomfortable amount of sense.

* * *

"Hey, have you seen my class ring?" she asked Felice that night, after a thorough search of both her own bedroom and the bathroom had turned up nothing. "Oh—your phone!"

Her roommate was sitting on the couch, staring down at her phone…and Cora had just caught sight of its perfectly restored screen before her question was fully out of her mouth.

Felice glanced up, smiling. "Yes, I had it fixed on my way home. My grandma said she was going to send me a check for it as an early birthday present. Wasn't that sweet of her?"

It was, if it was true, but Cora could not help but notice that the question about her ring had gone unanswered. "Yeah, that's really nice," she said, trying to smile back. "Have you seen my ring, though?"

"Didn't you wear it today?" Felice asked.

Cora shook her head. "No, I couldn't find it. I thought I left it in the bathroom last night, but it wasn't there this morning. I've looked in my room, too, and I didn't see it there either."

"Are you sure? Maybe you left it on your nightstand, and it fell off and rolled under your bed."

She'd thought of that, despite the fact that she had no memory of leaving it on her nightstand. "I looked under my bed. It's not there."

Felice gave her a sympathetic look. "Do you think you could have lost it skiing yesteday?"

"No, I had gloves on. And I know it made it home last night."

"Then I'm sure it'll turn up. If you had it last night, it can't be that deeply buried."

Cora chewed her lip, not sure what to say. She didn't _want_ to come straight out and accuse Felice, but what else could have happened to her ring?

"What is it?" Felice said, after Cora had stood in silence for a moment.

"Are you…are you sure you haven't seen it?" she asked, hearing her own voice shake.

"No, Cora, I _haven't_." There was a final, resentful tone in Felice's voice that implied she knew exactly what Cora was thinking, and Cora cringed inwardly at the thought of how hurtful her suspicions were if they were inaccurate. "I'll let you know if I do."

 _But maybe she knows what you're thinking because it's_ true _,_ Cora could not help but think as she skulked back to her bedroom. She did not _want_ to believe her best friend had stolen from her—the betrayal hurt even more than the loss of the ring that represented her parents and her hometown and all her high school friends and four of her happiest years. But what other explanation was there?

 _She's not a thief,_ part of her said. _She only stole from that restaurant because her abusive boyfriend made her._

 _How do_ you _know that?_ another voice in Cora's head objected. _That's just what she_ told _you. You don't know if it's true._ And it was quite true that she knew none of the details of the case and had merely taken Felice's word for it.

 _But this doesn't make sense,_ she argued back. _There's no reason to steal my class ring. She can't sell it; no one else wants it._ And though it was an expensive ring—her parents had made her pay half, and half had been $350—it did have her high school and class year emblazoned on it. The features that gave it sentimental worth far above its high cost would make it worthless to anyone else. No one would want to buy it.

 _Ah, but couldn't the gold and the diamonds and the amethyst be reused?_ asked the same little voice that had argued against Felice's innocence in the previous case.

Cora shut her bedroom door behind her, looked up a nearby pawn shop on her phone, and dialed.

"I'm thinking of pawning my high school ring," she said quietly when an older woman answered. "But I was wondering if you could give me an idea of how much I might get for it?"

"We'd have to see the ring, dear. Jewelry varies considerably."

Of course. "But you would buy a high school ring, even though it's got a school and year engraved on it?"

"That depends on the quality. If it's an expensive metal and a quality stone, we might. All of that can be reworked."

"Right," she said, her heart sinking. "So I know you would need to see it to make me a real offer, but just so I could get an idea…I need, like, $200. My ring is 14-karat gold, and there are ten diamond chips, and an amethyst. Do you think it's possible for me to get that much?"

"It's certainly possible, if all that seems authentic. Would you like to bring your ring in, dear?"

"I–I'm not sure," she said, feeling a dull ache in her chest. "I'm not sure if I want to sell yet...but thank you."


	9. Chapter 9

Cora sighed inwardly at the noise of Felice in the kitchen as she stepped into the apartment on Thursday evening. She and her roommate had avoided each other for the past three days, barely speaking and tiptoeing around each other's presence. It was awkward and tense and miserable, but Cora could see no way around it. She still strongly suspected that Felice had stolen her ring, and she was not so much angry as deeply grieved at the thought. It was not about the ring, although it had been very dear to her—it was about the difficulty of remaining close to someone who seemed willing to steal from her. She had spent far more time in recent days feeling wounded over Felice than mourning the loss of the ring.

Felice, meanwhile, was quietly resentful. Cora knew that her friend knew what she thought, and she also knew that Felice's obvious ire was no indication of her innocence—even if she were guilty, of course she would still have to act as though she were insulted.

The week had thus far felt like living with a ghost—the ghost of a friendship that Cora did not believe would ever be again. She made her way quickly back to her room, trying not to hear the silence pressing around her. There was no greeting called out between the two of them as there would usually be, nor would she be welcome to share whatever meal Felice was making, and she suddenly wished she had never owned any expensive jewelry at all.

Cora's eyes fell on it as soon as she flicked on her bedroom light. The ring. Sitting on her bedside table, glittering innocently up at her. A small spot had been cleared off for it, her bottles of lotion and box of tissues and scattering of earrings pushed aside so that it could not be missed, and she knew instantly that it had been Felice who had set it there.

She wanted to feel relieved—she wanted to feel _happy_ —at the thought that her class ring was not gone for all eternity, but her heart was dragging on the apartment's rough carpet. She may not have said the words, but her eyes and her attitude had quite clearly accused her best friend.

She wanted to crawl under her bed and not face Felice tonight—or ever again—but she knew her roommate knew she had discovered the ring by now and stood _waiting_ for her response, and so Cora slipped back down the hall.

"Felice?" she asked softly, stepping into the kitchen, where she found Felice mixing a salad, her back to the door.

Felice grunted, an acknowledgement that Cora had been heard, but she did not turn around.

"I–I saw you found my ring."

"Yes," Felice said, her voice emotionless, "I did. I did tell you I would let you know if I saw it."

Cora felt her face flush at the reminder of their conversation on Monday night. "Yes, I know," she murmured, wanting the floor to swallow her whole. "Um, where did you find it?"

"It was on the bathroom floor. Something caught my eye as I pushed the curtain back to get out of the shower this morning—there was this odd flash of light on the floor, sort of behind the toilet. So I looked closer and saw it was your ring reflecting the light. I think it just rolled back there."

It was an odd thing to have happened, given that the sink where she had set the ring was on the other side of the bathroom—but it was a _small_ room, Cora supposed, and she guessed that she or Felice could have easily kicked it once it was on the floor. She thought she'd given the entire floor a good look on Monday, but it was true that she had not felt like crawling around on her hands and knees after a day spent skiing, so perhaps her search had not been as thorough as she had told herself it was.

"Oh," Cora said quietly to the back of Felice's head, not sure what else to say, and aching with the impossibility of restoring this friendship. "I–I'm really sorry about how I…" She trailed off, frightened at the further damage the words _thought you stole it_ might do. "I…I really feel awful."

"I'm _sure_ ," Felice said, her voice clipped, "that you _do_."

 _Don't cry,_ Cora told herself firmly, blinking furiously at the contempt she could hear in her friend's voice.

"Thank you for returning it," she said, struck suddenly that Felice would probably have been quite justified in merely flushing the ring down the toilet.

It was, of course, the absolute worst thing she could have said. Felice whirled around, her dark eyes blazing. "Dammit, Cora, of _course_ I returned it. What else did you imagine I would do if I found it? It wasn't _mine_!"

Cora closed her eyes for a moment, wishing with everything in her that none of this had happened. "I'm sorry," she squeaked. "I'm really, really sorry!"

She fled the kitchen before either of them could say anything more.

* * *

Several hours later, Cora knocked softly on Felice's door. She'd spent the evening out, wandering the neighborhood, almost believing that the stifling awkwardness in the apartment would suffocate her if she stayed. She hated how she'd acted, she hated that she'd thrown such a lovely friendship away, but most of all, she hated how much she knew she'd hurt Felice with her suspicions. For it had occurred to her that the unpleasant truth of the matter was that Felice had been under no obligation to tell Cora anything about her history—in fact, Cora knew that Felice told hardly anyone. Had her friend not chosen to share the arrest with her, Cora never would have known, and it never would have occurred to her that anything more had happened to the ring than falling in a hard-to-see place. But her roommate had not told her about her record so that she might have an easy suspect when something went missing; she'd told her because she trusted her.

And this was how Cora had responded.

When she'd at last returned home, determined to offer a better apology and beg for the forgiveness she did not think she deserved, her roommate's door had been closed, and for a moment, she'd told herself that perhaps Felice was in bed, and the conversation would have to wait until morning. But then she'd caught sight of the faint glow of a lamp beneath the door, and she'd forced herself to knock.

There was a long silence in response, but just as she was about to walk away, telling herself they would talk later, she heard Felice say, "Yes?"

Cora swallowed, half wanting to flee to her own room. "May I come in?"

Another pause. "All right."

Slowly, she turned the knob and slipped inside the room, where she found Felice stretched out on her bed, her eyes focused on her laptop screen. Somehow, not having her friend looking at her while she considered how she'd hurt her made this easier.

"I've behaved terribly this week," she said simply. "I've been awful to you, just awful, and I'm so sorry. I had no excuse to act the way I did, and I had no justification at all to suspect you'd done anything wrong. I hate the way I've acted, and I hate what I thought, because I know I've hurt you terribly, and that's the last thing I'd want to do." She paused, breathing hard, her heart beating as though she'd just run a marathon, and she watched as Felice slowly raised her eyes and pushed her computer aside.

For a long moment, they stared at each other, and then Cora found the courage to speak again. "I wanted to ask for your forgiveness, but I understand if you don't feel that you can give it to me."

"Of course I can give it to you," Felice said softly. "Of course."

Cora had not expected to be forgiven so quickly and so easily—or forgiven at all, for that matter—and for a horrible moment, she wondered if Felice was merely joking. "Are you–are you sure? I should never have—"

"Don't talk me out of it," Felice said, laughing softly. "Look, why don't you sit down?" She sat up herself, giving Cora room to take a seat on the bed beside her.

"I'm so sorry I didn't trust you," Cora said as she sat down. "I should have, because you've trusted me."

Felice shrugged. "Yes, but I'm sure you will next time. And I could see it from your perspective—I knew how suspicious it looked, for your ring to go missing at the same time that I came up with so much money to fix my phone. I could understand why you thought what you did."

It was almost worse to think that Felice had so clearly understood why she seemed like a criminal in Cora's eyes. "I don't imagine that made it hurt any less," Cora said, still tasting the bile of her own regret.

Felice laughed again. "Well, no, it didn't."

"I hate hurting people," Cora said softly. "Especially when it's someone I care about."

"That's a lovely thing to say, and I know you enough to know you really mean it," Felice said, taking Cora's hand and squeezing it lightly. She paused. "Your apology was really lovely, too—that wasn't what I was expecting."

"No?" Cora couldn't think what else she might have said or what Felice could possibly have thought she'd hear.

"No, I thought you'd apologize the way so many people do—tell me you were sorry, _but_ , and tell me why you were justified in thinking what you did, and how it was really my fault you were suspicious."

"Of course not! None of it was your fault. I've heard those kind of apologies myself, though."

Felice shook her head. "Probably not as much as I have," she said softly. "That's how Peter always used to apologize."

"He would apologize to you?" Cora had never quite pictured Felice's abusive boyfriend telling her he was sorry.

"Oh, all the time—but it was always awful, and I always felt worse than before. He'd tell me the next morning—sometimes while I was trying to hide the bruises with make-up—that he was sorry he'd had to hit me—and it was always 'had to hit you,' as though he had no choice in the matter—but if I hadn't been flirting with his friend, or home late making him suspicious, or whatever else he'd made up in his mind, then it wouldn't have happened. He broke my wrist once,"—Cora flinched, not having known it had been that bad…and then mentally kicked herself for imagining that there was some mild form of "not that bad" abuse—"and when I got home from the emergency room and he realized what he'd done, he–he told me he didn't know why I didn't handle him better when I knew how angry he could get, and why did I always make him so mad when I knew what the consequences were? Why wasn't I more careful?"

It was the longest, and most specific, description Felice had ever given her about her last relationship, and it made Cora sick to her stomach. "I'm sorry," she said, reaching out to hug her roommate and wishing she could have protected her. "I'm so sorry you were treated that way."

"That's why I stole that money," Felice said suddenly as she held on to Cora. "I was so afraid not to do what he said."

"I know," Cora whispered, feeling even guiltier for her suspicions. "I know, and it was so wrong of me to use that against you."

"Thank you for saying that," Felice said softly as they broke apart. "After I finally got away from Peter, I slowly started to realize that half the world apologizes the way he always did, as though the injured party is somehow the one at fault. I know it's not done with the same malicious intent and the control and the mind games, but it always makes me want to scream when I hear people do it. I was so afraid that was the apology I was about to get from you, and I didn't think I could stand it."

Cora shook her head. "I wouldn't have done that."

"No," Felice said, studying her, "I don't believe you _would_ have done that. I probably should have known better…sometimes it's still hard for me to trust people."

Which, in Cora's opinion, made it a miracle that Felice was still willing to speak to her. "Then I'm even sorrier that I violated your trust. I hope we're still friends."

"Of course we are," Felice said, her face breaking into a warm smile. "Of course we are."

"I have something for you," Cora said, smiling back. "I got this tonight, but I wasn't sure if I'd be able to give it to you—if you'd want to talk to me, or if you'd be willing to accept it." When she'd picked it out two hours ago at Macy's, she'd been half-sure she'd be taking it back, and she could feel relief washing over every inch of her as she took the small box out of her pocket.

"Oh, you didn't have to get me anything! But that's very sweet."

"Do you remember those horrible pink, plastic necklaces that were so popular when we were kids? The little 'best friends' broken hearts, where you each got one half?" Cora asked as she passed the box to Felice.

"And then there was all this drama between a bunch of six-year-olds over who gave one to who?" Felice said, giggling. "Yes, I do remember those. That's not what this is, is it?"

"No!" Cora laughed. "But I thought of those when I found this." She watched as Felice lifted the lid of the jewelry box to reveal a swirly gold heart pendant with tiny diamond chips tracing along the top.

"Oh, it's beautiful," Felice breathed. "But, Cora, I can't let you do this. It–it looks _expensive_ —"

It hadn't been cheap, but Cora was not destitute—she had a small stipend from the undergraduate classes where she served as an assistant—and she covered Felice's hand with her own. "Please, I'm not worried the cost. I–I'd like you to have it."

"Thank you," Felice said, smiling softly as she took the necklace from its box and fastened it around her neck. "It's very pretty, and I'll think of you when I wear it."

"We're all right?" Cora asked quietly, still disbelieving this had gone so well.

"We're all right," Felice said, hugging her again. "But I think we are both desperately in need of chocolate right now. Do you want to go Max Brenner?"

"Now?" It was past ten.

But Felice was already on her feet and reaching for her coat. "Sure—they're open till midnight, aren't they? And I want to share the fondue with you. This has been far too stressful of an evening not to end it with chocolate."


	10. Chapter 10

AN: Since we haven't had any Cobert for two chapters now, here's a LOT of them...and it's Valentine's Day, of all things. :-)

* * *

The Saturday morning just before Valentine's Day found Cora in the backseat of a cab, her elbow resting on the duffel bag Felice had handed her before she'd left the apartment.

"You'll need this stuff today," her roommate had said in response to Cora's puzzled look. "Robert asked me to pack it for you, because he didn't want to give the surprise away and tell you where you were going."

"Is he taking me somewhere for the weekend?" she'd asked, rather nervous at the prospect of spending the night in a hotel with Robert. It also didn't make sense with the plans he'd supposedly made to take her to dinner and the theatre that evening.

Felice had shaken her head. "Oh, no. You'll just need a couple things for _today_."

Several weeks ago, Robert had suggested seeing _An American in Paris_ on Broadway after dinner at the very French Marseille restaurant nearby, and Cora had eagerly agreed, thinking an evening of France sounded like a wonderfully romantic way to mark the holiday. A few days later, though, his plans appeared to have expanded, for he'd asked if she could be free all day on Saturday for a surprise he'd like to give her. She'd happily agreed to that as well, wondering what else he meant to do on top of what would already be a lovely evening, and he'd told her a cab would pick her up outside her apartment at nine that morning.

She was now heading downtown along the East River with absolutely no idea of her destination. Should she look in the bag Felice had packed? She hadn't been told _not_ to. She loved surprises, but curiosity was beginning to get the better of her, and even if its contents did reveal the day's agenda, she reasoned that would still be surprise enough.

It had not been heavy, nor did it look particularly full, so when Cora unzipped it, she was not surprised to find it was nearly empty. A shoebox was resting on top, and she recognized it as the glittery, open-toed heels she planned to wear to the theatre tonight. The little cocktail dress she'd picked out for the evening was carefully folded underneath the box, clearly announcing that Robert did not intend for her to have time to return to the apartment before dinner. She wished Felice had thought to toss some make-up in the bag—she was wearing only the lightest bit of foundation and lip gloss, Robert having told her to dress casually for the day, and she'd intended to redo it all before the evening. Oh well, she thought, shrugging the matter off. Robert did not care how much make-up she had on.

But what was this? She lifted the dress and found, of all things, her bathing suit underneath, along with a pair of flip flops. She was expected to _swim_ somewhere, and then toss on her evening clothes and head out for a formal night? Was Robert _insane_? Didn't he know women didn't just shower and go on? She would need to dry her hair, and redo all the curls, and she had no make-up to replace that which would be washed off…nervously, Cora zipped the bag shut and tried to tell herself that wherever she was going, she would be able to leave in plenty of time to go home and dress up. She supposed this meant there was an indoor pool involved, but she could not think why going for a swim in mid-February seemed like such a wonderful idea to Robert in the first place, anyway.

The need for a swimsuit became clear when the cab dropped her off in front of an expensive day spa near the Village. Cora knew the place had a sizeable complex of swirling hot tubs and relaxation pools and steam rooms and saunas, and she knew girls in her program who were fond of occasionally buying day passes to use these facilities, although she herself had never been able to justify the cost. Robert, she supposed, had bought one of these for her, and she was to spend a relaxing day lounging around in the water—a welcome and very indulgent thought after all the long days she'd had recently as she frantically tried to finish a final project that was due in March and suddenly seemed months behind. It would also allow her plenty of time to return home and dress, and she relaxed at the realization she would not be expected to attend the theatre looking like she'd just climbed out of a swimming pool.

The small scale of her imaginings, however, made her blush a few minutes later when she realized Robert's full intentions.

"Ah, Miss Levinson…we have you down for the Moroccan rose sea salt scrub first," said the woman who was checking her in—the woman she'd thought was about to hand her a day pass and direct her toward the pools.

"First?" Cora squeaked, as though she'd never heard the word before. _First?_ She did not know if she was more surprised to be booked for something, or to realize that Robert had scheduled _multiple_ treatments.

"Yes, if you've booked any of the body scrubs, we usually start there," the young receptionist said. "It's better for your skin if you do that before your massage, rather than after." She scanned the computer. "Would you prefer to rearrange things?"

Cora shook her head. "Oh, no, it doesn't matter." As though she would complain about the order of spa treatments! "It's only, I didn't schedule any of this at all, so I didn't know…I didn't even know I'd be here today. Today was a surprise. A Valentine's present."

"Oh, how sweet!" The other woman smiled. "Well, you've clearly got someone who loves you very much. You've got your Moroccan rose scrub in about half an hour—you could relax in the hot pools for a bit first, if you'd like—then you're booked for lunch, and after lunch we have you down for a ninety-minute massage, and then later you'll have a coconut milk manicure and pedicure. Oh, and I take it you must have plans tonight? Or is that a surprise too?"

Cora shook her head, too stunned at the agenda she'd just been read to speak at first. "No," she managed to say. "I mean, that is, yes, we have plans, but they're not a surprise. My boyfriend's taking me to dinner and the theatre."

"The one who booked all this? What a sweet, sweet man!"

Cora nodded, blushing at the extravagance of it all. She expected that a single spa service here was at least $100, and a full day of treatments must cost a dizzying amount. She still was not entirely sure what Robert had seen in a starving art student from Cincinnati.

"Well, you'll be quite ready for a night out," the receptionist went on. "You're also having your hair done in our salon, and your make-up, too."

And she'd thought Robert didn't understand she'd need time to dress up! She expected now to look far prettier than she'd planned on her own—she hadn't had her hair done for an event since her high school prom, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd bothered to have her nails done professionally.

The hours leading up to all that would be heavenly, too. She was not entirely sure what was involved in the Moroccan rose scrub, but it sounded exotic and luxuriously decadent, and she could only imagine how wonderful a long massage would be after all the hours she'd spent sitting stiffly in front of an easel or hunched over her sketches. She could almost feel her back and her neck sighing in gratitude at the suggestion alone.

 _You are amazing!_ she texted Robert as she stepped into the dressing room she'd been led to. _I can't believe you've given me all this!_

 _So you were surprised,_ he texted back with a small smiley face.

 _Absolutely blown away,_ she told him. _And touched—I think this is the sweetest thing anyone's ever done for me!_

* * *

Cora was waiting in the spa lobby, watching through the front windows, at six o'clock when Robert pulled up in a cab. He had barely opened his door to get out before she had rushed out onto the sidewalk, eager to see him and thank him and kiss him.

She had left her bag and her earlier clothes in a locker, where she'd been told she could return for it later, and she was now wearing a red satin dress with a sweetheart neckline that stopped a few inches above her knees. The skirt had a slight flare to it, swinging a bit when she walked, and there was a small, girlish bow at her waist. Her heels were silver and sparkly, and she was grateful she'd chosen a pair where her newly-polished toes peeked out.

Cora felt wonderful and beautiful, the salon team having turned her into a movie star version of herself, and she grinned when she saw the slack-jawed expression on Robert's face. She was apparently not the only one who thought she looked especially pretty.

"My God, Cora," he said. "You're absolutely gorgeous. Not that you're not always gorgeous, but…" He trailed off, staring at her as though they'd never met before. "Wow," he murmured.

Cora giggled. "So you're pleased?" she asked, reaching out for him as he wrapped his arms around her waist. "I'll do to take out tonight?"

"My darling, you will _more_ than do," he said, kissing her warmly.

They both climbed into the backseat of the cab, and Robert gave instructions to the driver to take them to Marseille as Cora settled against his shoulder. She felt pretty and relaxed and warm and happy and grateful and so very in love, and she wanted nothing more than to be in his arms.

"Darling, I've had the most wonderful day," she said, kissing him again. "Thank you so, _so_ much. Every bit of that was lovely."

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," he said, drawing her closer still. "I know how stressed you've been with your degree lately. I thought this might help."

She _was_ stressed, as she was hurrying to finish everything in time to apply to graduate this spring, but _heavens_. She would have been happy and relaxed enough if he'd merely sent her for a manicure at a cheap nail salon. She had known that Robert was wealthy and generous since the day he'd handed her the cab fare, but his eagerness to share his money with her still stunned her sometimes.

"That was very sweet, Robert, and it did help. I'm about as stressed now as a limp noodle," she said, laughing.

"Well, you certainly _smell_ better than a limp noodle." His nose was pressed against her hair, and he took a deep breath. "You smell like roses and spices, and your skin is so soft." She had shed her coat when she'd gotten in the taxi, and he was running his hands over her arms and shoulders, bare except for the thin straps of her dress.

"Mmm, that was that Moroccan scrub thing you had me do first," she murmured, distracted by the kisses he was pressing against her temple, cheek, and jaw. The substance that had been rubbed into her skin had smelled heavenly—roses and spices, as he'd observed—and she'd known that the scent had seeped into her pores, in spite of the shower she'd taken later. It had also made her skin feel as smooth as an infant's.

"Moroccan?" he asked, pulling away slightly so that he could give her a puzzled look.

"Yes, don't you remember the sea salt scrub?"

Robert grinned sheepishly. "I confess that I couldn't make heads or tails of the spa menu, so I sent it to my sister. I told her to make sure you had a long massage, but beyond that, to pick out whatever she thought girls liked."

She giggled. "Well, tell her she did well, and the girl in question liked it all very much. And the massage was especially wonderful, so I'm glad you thought of that." Her therapist had found knots she hadn't even known she'd had, and she didn't think she'd felt so loose since elementary school. "I think I'd almost forgotten how it felt _not_ to have my neck stiff from painting!"

He kissed the tip of her nose. "Yes, I'd noticed you stretching it a lot. I'm glad you feel better, darling."

 _She_ had not noticed herself doing that, and it warmed her to think that he had observed her so intently that he knew her better than she knew herself. She kissed him, slipping her arms around his neck to pull him closer, neither of them looking up again until the cab driver cleared his throat loudly, announcing their arrival at Marseille.

* * *

"This has been the loveliest day ever, Robert," Cora said, snuggling up to him in the back of another taxi as they drove away from the theatre. He'd spent a fortune today in cabs alone, but he'd refused all her suggestions of the subway, citing her high heels, as well as her bare legs in the freezing temperatures. "And all I've got to contribute to it is a _cake_!" They were on their way to Robert's flat, where they'd planned to have dessert after the show. She'd offered to make her favorite raspberry chocolate torte, a heavenly concoction of melted fine chocolate bars and cream and butter and crushed berries, and she'd delivered it to him yesterday evening.

Robert kissed the top of her head. "If you think the only thing you've contributed to the evening is your cake, then you're clearly not sitting where I'm sitting. I've spent my Saturday night in the company of the most beautiful woman in America, after she's let me pamper her all day. I would say that the cake barely comes into it."

She smiled. "Are the women in England better looking than me?" she asked mischievously.

"Of course not, love. Why on earth would you think that?"

"You said I was only the most beautiful woman in America," she said, pretending to pout.

"Then I was quite in error." He kissed her hair again. "I have spent my evening with the most beautiful woman in the English-speaking world. And we are now on our way to my apartment, where I'm hoping she'll let me hold her very close."

How lovely that sounded, she thought as she nestled her head against his chest, letting her eyes drift shut. She'd longed to be cuddled up with him on his couch, letting him kiss her senseless, throughout the play. _An American in Paris_ had been a romantic story about a young American soldier who fell in love with a French girl after the war, their worlds colliding as they realized they were destined to be together, and it had felt very near to Cora's own heart. Her hand had been entwined in Robert's throughout both acts.

"Are you tired, love?" she heard him ask, and she shook her head.

"No, just relaxed. And comfortable in your arms." She felt him kiss her again.

Once they arrived in Robert's apartment, she cut them two pieces of the rich, ganache-covered cake as he poured them each a glass of red wine, and they settled onto his couch, tacitly agreeing that it was far too hard to cuddle together while sitting at the table.

Warmed by the wine and the day and the company, Cora kicked her legs over Robert's knees, wanting to be close to him. The cake slices were quickly finished off so that they could move on to the more important business of each other. Cora's legs tingled as Robert ran his hand along them, and she pressed closer to him as they kissed, shivering as his fingers moved upward to her hip.

"Is this all right, darling?" he asked, pausing at the tremor in her body. But she only nodded, kissing him enthusiastically. Of course it was all right. Nothing could be more right than this.

How she _wanted_ him as his hands roamed over her body, as she buried her fingers in his hair, as she thrilled at the soft growl she heard in the back of his throat as she shifted closer still. She knew very well that she had still not been sure she wanted this with Robert, had certainly not intended the evening to go this way when she had awakened that morning, but such considerations were easily drowned out by the pounding of her heart and the throbbing in her body.

Slowly, she leaned backwards on the couch, tugging him along with her, and he followed willingly, so that she was soon lying on her back, Robert leaning over her.

"Darling—" he began, but she pulled his face to hers for another kiss, silencing him and fervently hoping he would take the lead. Tentatively, she felt his right hand trace up her side, as though unsure how much she would allow, but she did not flinch when he reached her breast.

"All right?" he asked, caressing it, but all she could do was nod, for it felt too good to have his hand there to form coherent words.

"Do you want this, Cora?" he breathed, and she nodded again. "Are you quite sure?"

"Yes, _please_ ," she whispered, opening her eyes and thrilling at the change in his own pupils. "Please, but…not here." The idea of losing her virginity on his couch suddenly made her feel like a teenager sneaking her boyfriend over to a late-night babysitting job.

"No, not here." He stood, and she was suddenly terribly cold at the loss of his body, but before she could move to sit up herself, Robert had swept her up in his arms, and she sighed softly. To be _carried_ to his bed was more than she would have dreamed of.

He set her down at the foot of it and began to slowly remove her dress, his fingers gently caressing each bit of newly exposed skin, leaving her body tingling everywhere they had touched. She felt suddenly shy as she stood before him in her underwear, and she gave a slight gasp as she felt him reach for her bra.

His hand froze immediately. "Cora, are you sure you want this? We can stop, if you need to."

But she shook her head. No, she certainly did not want to stop now! He touched a soft kiss to her forehead, and she felt a sense of safety sweep over her. She felt nothing more than warm desire as he removed her underclothes, and she blushed with pleasure as he surveyed her body, his eyes widening.

"You are _beautiful_ ," he breathed, "absolutely _beautiful_."

"But you're still dressed," she said, reaching for the buttons on his shirt. "It's not fair."

"And you're shivering," he told her, kissing the top of her head. "Get under the covers and I'll join you in a moment."

She nodded and got into his bed, which he had apparently turned down earlier, she supposed in anticipation of a late night. Cool in her state of undress, she drew the blanket over her, but what she really wanted was Robert's arms around her, and she watched curiously as he removed his own clothes, feeling her cheeks grow pink at the sight of him.

Cora tossed the covers aside as he climbed in next to her, shivering with something entirely different from the temperature as he pulled her close and began to kiss her again, his hands smoothing over her body from her shoulders to her knees. She murmured with pleasure, and then he whispered, "Are you ready, darling?"

Her stomach twisted slightly, for here was the moment she'd been waiting for and worrying over for years, but she nodded, childishly wondering if it would hurt. Gently, Robert pushed her onto her back and stretched himself over her, and she closed her eyes, almost afraid to breathe.

And then she felt _him_ against her leg…and then he pushed inside of her, a sudden, sharp, quick shove, and she could not hold back a squeal at the harsh pinch she felt inside her body.

Robert froze, his body still inside hers. "Oh God, Cora," she heard him say, horror in his voice, and she blinked her eyes open to see a matching expression on his face. "I'm so sorry; I–I didn't realize that you—that you were…" She felt him pull out quickly, and she whimpered at the loss of him, for the sharp sting had already begun to fade. "Have I hurt you badly, darling?" he asked, lines of worry etching themselves along his forehead.

"No!" She shook her head, feeling her face reddening with embarrassment. "No, it just—it stung a bit, but…not badly. And I'm sorry, I didn't want—I–I didn't mean…" She trailed off, feeling tears pricking at her eyes. She had not been embarrassed about her virginity, but it had seemed so very immature to announce it to him with a plea for gentleness. Now she wished she'd warned him—how terribly that had gone!

Robert kissed her softly. "Shh, it's all right. It's a lovely thing, Cora, and nothing to be ashamed of. I only wish I'd known to go more slowly, and I wish I hadn't had to hurt you."

"Someone had to do it, and I'm glad it was with you," she said, feeling her tears fade as she gazed up at him and ran her fingers over his hair.

"I love you," he whispered, leaning down to kiss her again.

"Will you…could you do it again?" she asked shyly, suspecting it would feel very different this time.

"Of course, sweetheart. Tell me right away if I hurt you."

She felt him slip slowly in, gently and carefully now, and although she could feel a slight soreness from before, he felt simply _wonderful_ , and she sighed, relaxing against him as he kissed her.


	11. Chapter 11

"I hope you're not still considering remaining in New York until next autumn," Violet Crawley said over lunch in Downton's dining room. "It's a terribly foolish idea, and I can't think what could be more irresponsible and more pointless."

Robert winced inwardly. He had a tendency to forget his mother's bluntness when he was away, but he had returned to Yorkshire for a week at the end of February, wanting time to look over the estate's accounts in detail. He'd only been at it for a day and a half, but what he'd seen had convinced him he would be best served to move back to the U.K. in March as originally planned, rather than pushing to stay in New York for an additional six months. Downton's finances were not in dire straits, and he did not expect a collapse this week, but the truth of it was that the estate's business had not been managed well under his father.

Much of Downton's support came from money that had been made through the sale of various chunks of the estate's land in the early decades of the twentieth century. This fortune was supplemented by income from rentals of the abbey's great hall for events and from a small bed-and-breakfast operation in a couple of the property's prettiest cottages, but that money had not been enough to cover repair expenses over the last twenty years, and the former earl had been dipping further and further into the principal.

The damage, Robert believed, was not irreparable, but it was clear that far more needed to be done on the business end of the estate if he meant to pass the abbey on to his children and grandchildren. The great hall needed to be rented more than a few times a year, he needed to be able to charge higher rates, and the hotel operation needed to be far, far more profitable. He was reasonably confident he could make these things happen—he doubted he would even need to quit his day job, as he suspected this was more a matter of management, planning, and hiring well. Yet he was aware that he needed to at least be in the same country, and that he should start as soon as possible.

"No," he told his mother now, "I am not staying on in New York. I'll be home for good next month."

"Home to Downton, or home to London?"

"London," he told her. "I'll want to oversee the estate, but I believe I can manage that from the city." He intentionally did not mention that changes would need to be made, knowing what a panic the word would inspire in his mother.

Violet nodded. "You'll be at Downton on the weekends, then. I should tell you I'm thinking of moving to the dower house this spring—I'm not certain I want to live in this house alone. You'd be welcome to stay there with me when you're down here, but of course the abbey is now yours."

He paused, thinking immediately of Cora, who he hoped would be with him in England soon, and wondering if this was the moment to mention her. Of course, his mother sensed immediately that there was information being withheld.

"What is it, Robert? You're considering something, I can tell."

"I'm considering, Mother, when I'll be married."

She didn't blink, and he realized she thought he was speaking in the abstract. "Have you kept in touch with Jessica while you've been away?"

Jessica Lyttelton was the daughter of the marquess of Townshend, and he had dated her briefly a couple years earlier. There had been no serious feelings on either side, but it had been no secret to him that Jessica had long been his mother's favorite choice for his future countess.

"No, I have not been in touch with Jessica," he said firmly. "I have been dating a young woman from Cincinnati."

She stared at him blankly. "From where?"

"It's in Ohio," he said. "She's living in New York right now, studying for a graduate degree at New York University."

"This woman is an American." There was a final note in Violet's tone that implied there were no further information about Cora that she needed or wanted.

"Yes, she is."

"And you are engaged to this _American woman_."

"No, not yet. But I intend for us to be." It had been more than a month since he had decided to marry Cora, and he had already purchased an engagement ring. However, he had not yet raised the subject with her, for he suspected it was too soon. They hadn't even been dating a full six months, and he thought it was highly likely that Cora would be shocked to be asked to marry him while their relationship was still so new. He had intended to wait until summer, and even with his new plan to move back to England right away, he felt that this was still the best time frame. He'd be flying Cora over for a visit anyway; perhaps it would be romantic to ask her in London during a stroll along the Thames on a summer evening.

Of course, part of Robert's hesitation was also his nerves. If he were honest with himself, he had no idea what Cora might say when faced with the idea of leaving her country and her family and living on the other side of the ocean. He was also not entirely sure now how Cora felt about him.

As thrilled as he had been with her sudden desire for sex the night of their Valentine's date last weekend, it had seemed a very different matter the next morning. Cora had not seemed upset or regretful, but she had been unusually quiet as they'd eaten breakfast together, and she had not been quite her warm, bubbly self in the week since. Robert was terrified that sex had not, deep down, been something she truly wanted…and worst of all, he feared that she felt that he had somehow _bought_ her virginity. At moments, he had even wondered if this wasn't simply Cora's _feeling_ but rather a very accurate description of what had happened: he had given her a very expensive day and taken her out for an elaborate evening, and she had persuaded herself to end the evening with sex…and then regretted her impulsive decision in the harsh light of day. Sleeping with Cora had been the furthest thing from his mind when he had planned the day, but his intentions did not change the way it had all happened, and the thought that he had somehow taken advantage of her made him nearly ill.

"But when you propose to this American woman, you are sure she will say yes," his mother said, and he forced himself to focus on the conversation at hand.

"Yes," Robert said, ignoring the fluttering in his stomach that suggested he could not be sure. "Yes, she will. And I assume she will want to marry in Ohio, but then she will move to London." _Would she?_ he wondered.

"I see," said Violet icily. There was a painful pause as Robert waited for his mother's disapproval, which he was sure she would voice in no uncertain terms.

He was not disappointed. "Robert," she said, "I want to be very clear with you that to marry a woman who is so utterly unfamiliar with your world as a girl from _Ohio_ must surely be is nothing short of madness, and I think it will end in disaster."

He decided that this was perhaps not the best time to mention that Cora was also Jewish.

* * *

Cora herself did not feel, as Robert worried, that he had in any way "bought" her virginity. Indeed, the thought would not have occurred to her, for, while she had let him lead in the actual act, it was quite clear in her memory that it had been she who had led them both to it, she who had wanted it, she who had tacitly suggested it.

Nor did she regret the evening.

What she did feel was unsure, uncertain, almost frightened of what they'd done. For as much as she had enjoyed it, and as much as she knew she loved Robert, there was a nagging in the back of her mind, reminding her that she had intended to be with _one man_ , and one man only, for life and had thus been determined to wait until she was sure. While she was sure she loved Robert, and sure she wanted to spend her life with him, it had never been about her certainty of her own feelings alone. She had also wanted to be sure that the man in question was sure, sure that he was ready for a lifelong commitment. An engagement ring, if not a wedding band, might have been a prerequisite here—or at the very least, some mention of marriage.

And there had been nothing of the sort between her and Robert.

This was not necessarily alarming, or even surprising—they had not even been dating six months yet. She would have been taken aback at a proposal at this point, and she did not expect one in reaction to having slept with him.

What troubled her was the suspicion that there was likely not to be one—and now she'd given herself to him entirely. She knew Robert loved her, but she also knew he was planning to move back to England next month, as he'd told her upon his return to New York a couple nights ago. The distance, she imagined, would eventually break them.

Such philosophical concerns about how many men she preferred to be intimate with over the course of her life, however, were the least of Cora's problems at the moment. Her worries about their sex had now taken a far more practical turn.

At present, Cora was sitting on the edge of the closed toilet seat in her apartment bathroom, a thin, plastic stick in her hands, chewing her bottom lip as she waited for it to reveal its result.

When she had left Robert's the morning after, a small voice had whispered to her that they hadn't used any protection. As a virgin, she'd never seen much reason to bother with the pill—which, she guiltily noted, Robert probably just assumed she was on—and neither of them had reached for anything else. _Oh, you're not_ pregnant _!_ she'd told herself. What were the odds? She knew she was only fertile for a few days a month at the most—although she stubbornly refused to count whether February 11 was likely to have been one of them.

She had tried to put the matter out of her mind, but the possibility had gnawed at her for weeks now, and she'd longed for her period, darkly amused at the thought that she was eager for several days of cramps and mood swings. It had been due yesterday…and it hadn't arrived.

 _You've been a couple days late before,_ she tried to reassure herself. And it was true that she had been, but she'd stopped on her way home last night and bought a pregnancy test anyway. The box had recommended taking it in the morning, but she'd awakened today and found she couldn't face it, deciding to wait until evening when she'd have time to… To what? What could she possibly do?

 _"Please,"_ she whispered, her eyes drilling into the thin stick, willing a single, negative line to appear. _"Please."_

Cora checked her watch, but only three minutes had passed. The instructions had said anywhere from two to ten, and it felt as though the seconds were ticking backward.

She sighed, flexing her fingers. Her stomach had begun to ache sharply, and she wanted to believe it was the beginning of her period, but she knew it was only her anxiety.

And then…oh, God, a line was appearing! But before she could take a breath of relief, a second line formed across it.

 _You've remembered wrong,_ she told herself desperately, wanting to believe she'd mixed up the instructions of how to interpret the results. But she knew she'd read ten times that a single line was negative and a cross was positive…and a quick glance at the box resting on the side of the bathtub confirmed this.

Cora closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe. She _wanted_ to be happy—she'd never pictured herself feeling anything less than elated at her first pregnancy. Mothers were supposed to be happy to learn of their babies, and she'd wanted to be a mother for as long as she could remember.

But not now, not like this. Not while she was unmarried and unemployed and sharing a tiny New York apartment with a friend. Not when it likely meant raising her baby in her parents' house—oh, God, she would have to tell her _parents_ —with its father four thousand miles away.

 _You've ruined your life,_ she told herself as she felt the first of the tears slip past her closed eyelids. _You were_ stupid _, and now you've ruined your life._

She was not sure how long she sat there, feeling increasingly ill, but she eventually heard a soft knock on the door, accompanied by Felice's voice.

"Cora? You've been in there forever. Are you all right?"

No, she was not all right. Nothing was all right. "Yes," she said, hearing the wavering in her own voice as she tried to control her tears.

There was a pause, and she knew Felice had heard it, too. "Are you sure?" her roommate asked hesitantly.

And then, with a growing horror, Cora realized she couldn't _not_ tell her. She couldn't hide her humiliation from anyone: it would have evidenced itself by the summer.

Swallowing hard, she said, "You can come in."

The door handle turned and Felice stepped inside, her forehead creased with worry. "What's wrong?" she asked softly, and then Cora saw her eyes widen slightly as her gaze fell on the distinctive plastic stick in Cora's hands.

"I'm pregnant," Cora whispered. "I'm _pregnant_."

"Oh, _sweetie_ ," Felice breathed.

"I've ruined my life," Cora said, voicing her thoughts aloud for the first time.

"No, you haven't," Felice murmured, holding her arms out. Cora stood and stepped into them, letting Felice embrace her tightly. "You _haven't_ ," Felice said again. "Everything is going to be all right."

But all Cora could do was cry against her roommate's shoulder, for she couldn't imagine how any of this would ever be all right at all.


	12. Chapter 12

It was just after nine when Robert leapt up to answer the knock at his front door, a worried knot lodged stubbornly in his stomach.

Cora had texted nearly an hour ago, saying she needed to tell him something and asking if he was at home. He'd responded yes, of course, she was welcome to come now, and then he'd tried to distract himself with television while he wondered why on earth she would suddenly want to see him late in the evening.

He suspected she was not calling with happy news. In fact, he suspected it was the _worst_ sort of news—that she no longer wanted him. That she was breaking things off with him, now that he had told her he meant to move back to London.

Steeling himself, he opened the door…and slowly exhaled, the dimension of his worry changing entirely.

For Cora did not look as though she were here to say goodbye. She was quite calm, but her eyes were red and she had apparently been weeping, an appearance he did not think any woman would be eager to give if walking away from a man. Something, though, was clearly very wrong, and this realization left him too frightened to feel any relief that she was not leaving him.

"Cora…" He reached out for her, feeling his throat begin to constrict as she stepped into his arms and he felt a slight tremor in her body. Despite her assurances to the contrary, Robert had worried for months about the area where she lived, desperately wishing she were not walking alone after dark most evenings, and the thought that something terrible had happened made his mouth go so dry that he could barely speak.

"Have you…has someone… _hurt_ you?" he managed to ask hoarsely.

"No," she murmured against his chest. "No, it's all right. Nothing's happened to me."

"What's wrong, then?" he asked, feeling his worry ease only slightly. "Tell me what's wrong, sweetheart."

"I…" He waited a long moment for her to continue her sentence, but she didn't.

"Please tell me, Cora." He kissed her forehead and rubbed his hands soothingly up and down her back. "Whatever it is, I promise it's all right, but please tell me. You're scaring me."

"I'm pregnant."

"You…what?" he asked, the sentence echoing across his mind as he tried to comprehend it. She was… _pregnant_?

Having said the words seemed to have given her strength, and she stepped back, meeting his eyes now. "I'm pregnant," she said again.

This time, the phrase felt like a punch in the stomach, and he drew in a short gasp of air, trying to catch his breath.

"I wasn't on the pill," Cora was saying. "There wasn't any reason for me to be, because I wasn't sexually active, and I hadn't been planning on it—not that I didn't want it, I don't want you to think that—but of course you didn't know, because I didn't say anything, so I'm sure you thought I was using some sort of protection, and I understand why you thought that, and I should have—"

Still rather dazed, he waved her speech away before she could go any further. He realized, with a stab of guilt, that this had been at least a part of her strangeness in the days afterward: she'd been wondering if she'd turn out to be pregnant. It didn't matter now what she had or hadn't been taking or why or why not. In truth, he hadn't given protection any thought at all that night, but if he _had_ thought about it, he knew he would have assumed that Cora had taken care of it. As though it had been exclusively Cora's problem and none of his concern.

This was a deeply embarrassing realization as his girlfriend stood before him pregnant.

Robert's thoughts were careening wildly around his head, his mind a chaotic mess he could not begin to untangle, but one thing cut through the fog: _Cora was frightened._ He could see it in her eyes and hear it in her voice, and he had felt it in her body while they had embraced.

He took her in his arms again, wanting to comfort her and wishing he knew what she wanted to hear. "It's all right," he said, feeling an emptiness in his words as he tried to imagine how it would feel to be in her position. "We will get through this together, and this will all be all right."

She nestled closer, clinging tightly to him. She did not seem to be crying, but he heard her drawing shaky breaths, apparently trying to steady herself, and he held on, stroking her hair and her back and wondering wildly how they would handle this. He knew what the obvious solution was—marrying her, as he had already planned to do. But would she want to do that so soon? Before the baby was born?

Suppose she didn't even _want_ this baby? His heart was climbing his esophagus again.

"Cora?" he said softly after a moment. "Do you want to go sit on the couch and talk about this?"

She nodded and pulled away, wiping her eyes as she did so. He felt a sharp pain in his chest at the suggestion of her tears, and he took her hand, squeezing it and keeping it in his as he brought her to the sofa.

"I'm sorry," she murmured as they sat down.

"Sorry for what?" He looked at her blankly.

"Sorry for all this. Sorry for making such a mess. I should have stopped us—I should have said I wasn't protected."

"Oh, my darling," he said, kissing her forehead with a sigh. "You have _nothing_ to be sorry for." It was he who ought to be apologizing, he who had set the stage for that Saturday evening, he who had not been more careful with her, he who had so wantonly altered the course of her life. And what irony that she should have to tell him she wasn't 'protected,' when he saw it as his responsibility to protect Cora in all situations. "You are not the one of us who has made the mess. I am so, so sorry I let this happen to you."

"It's not your fault," she whispered as he gave her another hug.

"What would you like to do, darling?" he asked gently, praying that she'd want to keep the baby to raise…and that she'd agree to marry him.

"Well," she said softly, looking down at their still-entwined hands, "I haven't had much time to think…I only found out a couple hours ago. But I don't think I would be able to bear giving the baby away. I didn't _want_ to have a baby right now, but now that there is one…I don't think I can keep from loving it. I think it would hurt too much not to go on being its mother."

He squeezed her hand, suddenly realizing that of course Cora would feel this way about a baby. He could not see her wanting to do anything besides raise her own child.

"But I don't think I can live on my own with a new baby—I mean, I don't even know if I'll be able to find a job after graduation, especially a job that would support a child. So I think I'll have to move back home after I graduate this spring so that my mother can help me with the baby, and I'll see if I can find work in Cincinnati."

 _Cincinnati._ He didn't want her in Cincinnati, not unless he was in Cincinnati, too.

"What about me?" he asked. "Is there any place for me?"

"You're moving back to London," she said quietly, not meeting his eyes.

"But what if you went back to London with me?" She looked up sharply. "What if we were married? Because I'd very much like to marry you, Cora." She did not answer at first, and he held his breath. He had wanted to marry her so very badly for weeks now, had nearly exploded as he waited to ask her, and now he was even more desperate for it, his heart aching at the thought of her returning to Ohio to raise their baby alone.

"Please don't," she said at last.

"Please don't what?" he asked, his mouth going dry.

"Please don't ask me to marry you just because I'm pregnant," she said, pulling her hand back. "Please, I can't bear that."

"Cora, I—"

"That's not–that's not how I want it to be between us," she went on, her voice suddenly sharp with tears. She twisted her class ring on her finger. "I just…please, don't."

"Cora, that isn't how it is." He took both of her hands in his again. "I've wanted to marry you for some time now, but I thought…I thought you would think it was too soon to ask. I…I want to marry you so very much, darling. Because I can't bear to be without you…I've been dreading the thought of going back to London alone and wondering how soon you would marry me and join me there. I want to marry you for you, darling, because I think you're wonderful…not for the baby. Although of course I do very much want our baby now, too."

Her eyes were filled with tears, and he held his breath waiting for her to answer. "Will you?" he whispered after a long silence. "Will you marry me, Cora?"

She nodded, and he suspected she didn't trust herself to speak. He pulled her into his arms, so relieved he wasn't sure he could speak himself, kissing her as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Oh, _Cora_ ," he breathed after a moment. She was _his_ , he thought as he buried his nose in her hair and savored her soft scent. His to marry. His for life. "I love you," he whispered, kissing the top of her head.

She sat up to look at him. "Have you really wanted to marry me?" she asked, her voice suddenly shy. "You're sure it's not just because I'm pregnant with your baby?"

"Darling, no," he said, laying his hand against her cheek. "Please believe me."

"I do," she said, smiling. "I do believe you."

"And you? Would you be marrying me if you weren't pregnant?" he asked, and she nodded.

"Yes—that's why I couldn't bear for you to propose because of the baby. I've wanted a life and a future with you, but I didn't know if you wanted that—and I couldn't bear to think I'd forced it on you. I didn't want to marry a man I was desperately in love with if he'd married me for any other reason than that he loved me, too." She leaned forward for a long kiss.

"I promise you'll still get a real proposal," he said when they broke apart.

"Oh, Robert," she said, laughing. "I don't care about that!"

"But I do." He brushed her hair back from her face, running his hand through its silk. "I want to give you the most romantic proposal I can think of. I'll take you somewhere lovely and give you your ring," he promised, thinking of the diamond currently nestled in the drawer of his nightstand. He didn't think a weepy evening on his couch was quite the time to present it to her—Cora deserved something special.

A pretty blush came into her cheeks. "Thank you," she said quietly. She paused. "Robert, could you hold me for a bit?"

"Oh, I don't know," he said skeptically. "You know how I dislike having you near."

She giggled as he leaned back against the couch, holding his arms open so that she could snuggle into him, and she settled against him, her head resting on his chest.

"Have you been feeling all right, darling?" he asked as he caressed her. "Have you been sick at all?" He realized as he asked this how little he knew about pregnancy, about babies, about any of this.

"Oh no," she said. "It's far too early for any of that. I wouldn't know I was pregnant if I hadn't missed my period."

"I promise I'll take very good care of you," he told her. "I'll do everything I can to make sure you're comfortable."

She lifted her head to kiss his cheek. "I don't doubt that."

"Would you like to move in here right away, before we get married?" he asked. He was not quite sure when that would be, as he knew Cora needed to graduate in May. Perhaps he could stay for another couple months?

"I…don't think so," she said thoughtfully, resting her head against him again. "I want it to be special, when we're married. And to be honest, I assume we'll be moving to London then, and I don't really want to move all my stuff twice."

"When would you like—"

"Oh, let's not plan the wedding now," she said with a yawn. "It's late, and I'm tired, and it's too much for one night."

"Of course, darling." She was right, he thought. There was too much to be thought about and decided, and they'd made enough massive decisions for the evening. Nor did he much want to keep Cora up any later now that she'd mentioned her fatigue. "You ought to get to bed. You and the baby need rest."

"You're going to fuss for the next nine months, aren't you?" she asked, giggling.

"Yes, I am," he said, too pleased to deny it. He laid his hand across her still-flat belly, caressing it lightly and marveling at the thought that there was a baby inside. "I intend to make a huge fuss over the both of you."

Cora laid her own hand over his and pressed it gently, then kissed his cheek. "Can I sleep here tonight? I don't…I don't want to be apart from you yet."

"Of course you can." He didn't much want to say goodbye for the night either.

"It's only…I didn't think…I didn't think this conversation would go this way, and…I just…"

He could hear tears at the edge of her voice, and he remembered the fear he had seen in her eyes when she had first arrived. Had she thought he'd leave her? Had she thought this would be a discussion of how much money he ought to send her every month for the child? He pulled her closer, giving her a tight squeeze. "Shh. I love you." The statement drew a sniff from her, and he kissed the top of her head. "I think you really do need to go to bed." He suspected the return of her tears was at least partly because it was late and she was tired.

Cora nodded and sat up, wiping her eyes. "Yes, you're right. And I'm sorry—I don't mean to be clingy and annoying. I just…it's just been quite an evening."

He chuckled. "Yes, it has. We're getting married and having a baby all at once. And yes, it's terribly annoying when a beautiful woman asks if she can spend the night in my bed. I don't know how I'll ever get over it." He was pleased to draw a small laugh from her, and he went on. "I'll see if I can find something for you to sleep in. The trouble is, I've got this girl who occasionally spends the night here, and every time she does, she absconds with one of my sweatshirts. I don't know what it is she does with them." He'd lent her one the night his father had died, and another the night she'd conceived.

She grinned, blushing. "I keep them and sleep in them at home. It's like having you with me."

He felt something inside him melt at the thought of Cora lying in bed, basking in his scent and imagining he was there.

He was running a bit short on college sweatshirts now, but he managed to find one he'd bought to celebrate the London Olympics four summers ago, and Cora changed into this before stretching out next to him.

Robert felt a sudden jolt as her stomach touched him, and he tried to wrap his mind around the thought that he was not only holding his fiancée, but also his child, as he took Cora in his arms. _A baby_. He and Cora were getting married, and she was having a _baby_. He knew his mother—oh, God, what would his _mother_ think of all of this?—would say that his first child ought to be a boy, so that they would know they had an heir, but he suddenly realized that he hoped this was a girl, because he wanted it to be just like Cora.

"I want you to know," he said softly, "that I'm really, _really_ happy. I know this isn't the timing we would have planned for our lives, but I'm so, _so_ happy to be having a baby with you."

He saw tears shining in her eyes in the darkness, and he paused, frightened suddenly that he had made a difficult situation worse with his marriage proposal. Was he forcing on her a life she did not want?

"Is this…is this something you want?" he asked, his breath catching in his throat. "Have I made you happy? Really, have I made you happy?"

"Yes," she whispered. "You've made me very happy…you've always made me happy, ever since you fell in love with me."

"Since the day I saw you on the subway, then," he said, knowing how long he had loved her.

She laughed softly and kissed him.


	13. Chapter 13

Cora stirred, her eyes fluttering open, and she immediately felt a light kiss against her temple.

"Good morning, Mrs. Crawley," she heard Robert say, and she gave him a sleepy smile.

She didn't think she'd ever tire of those words. Robert had greeted her this way every morning since they'd married last week, a touch of irony in his voice, for of course her real title was now Lady Grantham.

"Good morning," she murmured. "Have you been awake long?"

"A half hour or so…I didn't want to wake you by getting up." He slowly ran his fingers through her hair. "How do you feel today?"

She considered, taking stock of her stomach as she fully awakened. She'd grown used, over the past couple weeks, to an unsettling queasiness each morning. It had been something she had gritted her teeth and tried to ignore back in New York, doing her best to assuage it with occasional crackers as she went on about her day. Being off on her honeymoon with Robert, where she could sleep as late as she liked—for she was also quite exhausted—and lounge in bed all morning, snuggling until the nausea passed, was heaven.

Unbeknownst to Robert, Cora had not needed to work all the way until graduation in May. Her thesis project had been due long before that—before the university's March spring break—to allow time for all projects to be reviewed by the faculty. She had submitted her collection of oil paintings last week and then married Robert the next day and flown to London with him, with the agreement that she would defend her thesis over Skype later in the spring. They both planned to fly back for her graduation. She was just now beginning to recover from her jetlag, so she was not eager to put herself through the journey again, but she had been told by both her doctor and her mother that she would be into her second trimester by May and would feel a great deal better.

And the actual flight here, she reminded herself, had been rather pleasant. Robert had insisted on first class tickets, in spite of her protests. "I thought you've said it's not worth spending thousands of dollars extra just to be a bit more comfortable for a few hours," she'd argued, knowing he'd talked before about what a waste first class was, and embarrassed that he'd spend so much money on her.

"It isn't worth it, generally," he'd agreed calmly as he'd typed his credit card number into the airline website. "But when the person in question is my newly pregnant wife, then I want to be sure she's as comfortable as British Airways can possibly make her."

And that, she'd discovered on the plane, was very comfortable indeed.

She felt his fingers still smoothing through her hair, and she returned to the present. "I feel a little sick, but not awful," she told him, answering his earlier question. "No worse than yesterday."

He kissed her again. "Do you want me to go get your breakfast?"

"Yes, please—thank you." He shifted, starting to sit up, and she sighed at the loss of contact. "I adore the way you wait on me, but I do hate when you leave."

He chuckled. "Believe me, no man happily leaves the bed of a beautiful woman. You know, we're lucky we aren't the earl and countess a hundred years ago—did you know the aristocracy would never have shared a bed?"

"I can't imagine all couples lived that way," she said, finding it hard to believe she would have ever wanted to sleep without her husband.

"Probably not," he agreed, "but all the really _smart_ people slept in separate beds."

"We would have just had to settle for not being smart."

Robert grinned. "Better to be lucky than smart. I'll go down and get you some breakfast, love—you'll feel worse if you don't eat." He brushed a quick kiss to her lips and got up, drawing a giggle from her as he made up for the loss of his warmth by pulling the heavier duvet over her before he left. There had been much teasing lately about her thin American blood, for she felt as though she'd been constantly freezing since she'd landed in England.

After she and Robert had landed in London, they had driven north to Yorkshire, where they had arrived at his ancestral home, Downton Abbey. His widowed mother, now the dowager countess of Grantham, still lived in the house, but Robert's sister had asked her up to London for the week, giving the newlyweds the house to themselves. Cora and Robert did not intend to live here for at least several years, as he planned to go on working in the capital for awhile, but he had suggested that the house would make an excellent base for a relaxing honeymoon as he showed her around Yorkshire.

Cora thought Downton was simply marvelous. She and Robert had installed themselves in the bedroom labelled Mercia, near the winding back staircase. It was a spacious room with soothing, light blue walls, two tall windows with cozy seats, and a romantic collection of Victorian furniture. Cora loved it, and though she was very excited about living in London, she was already fantasizing about all the time she and Robert would spend together here in future years, growing old together in this room.

It was strange, she thought as she lay there, to think that she now held the grand title _Countess of Grantham_. Perhaps it would have felt more real, she mused, had she had a stately wedding in the Downton village church, but she hadn't even had a simple ceremony back in Cincinnati, the way she'd always planned. Robert had asked her what she wanted to do the morning after they'd agreed to marry, suggesting they go to Ohio. He'd wanted to know if they'd be able to have a Jewish wedding for her sake, but she hadn't wanted any of that.

"I think I'd rather we just went to the courthouse," she'd told him. "Here in New York—just a civil ceremony. It'll be quicker that way—it takes months to plan a big wedding."

"But do you want a big wedding?" he'd asked. "Isn't that important to you—the dress and all? Haven't you been thinking about it since you were little?"

She had been, but… "But if we had it in Cincinnati, everyone…that is, I wouldn't want everyone to…" She knew she was turning pink, afraid for him to think she was ashamed of their baby, but he quietly took her hands.

"Are you embarrassed, Cora?" he asked gently. "You don't need to be, but are you?"

She nodded, immensely grateful not to have to say it. "If I invite my whole family and all our friends to a last-minute wedding, everyone will suspect I'm pregnant, and then of course there will be a baby less than nine months later. If I get married quietly, though, and just move to England, no one will remember exactly when…and no one in England has to know exactly when we married, either, just that we got married at some point while you were in America."

"Are you sure that's what you want?"

It wasn't, but she preferred it to having to imagine the gossip among her guests…older relatives whispering about her morals; her friends asking each other how she'd failed to grasp how birth control worked. "I think it's what I'd rather have," she said. "I–I want the baby; I'm not embarrassed about the baby. I just don't want…I don't like to think everyone's talking about it."

He kissed the palm of her hand. "If you're sure, darling."

She nodded. "Is it all right with you? Did you want the big wedding?"

"Cora, all I want is to end up married to you." He'd taken her in his arms then, and they'd held each other quietly for some time, Cora thinking that it was really all she wanted, too.

And as much as she'd secretly missed the grand white dress, the broken glass, the chuppah, the bridesmaids, the dancing, and everything else she'd always dreamed about for her wedding, Cora admitted to herself that she did not feel any less married now. The rings Robert had placed on her finger felt heavy with the weight of what they represented, a strong, firm circle that reminded her of the certainty of their love. She smiled softly as she remembered the night he had given her the first. Three days after she'd told him about the baby, he'd taken her for a romantic dinner at Tavern on the Green, followed by a carriage ride through Central Park, during which he'd formally asked her to be his wife and presented her with an ornate, delicate diamond ring on a thin gold band. He'd bought it new, but it looked like a better fit for the nineteenth century than the twenty-first, and she loved it for its elegance. By some stroke of luck, he'd apparently guessed her ring size, and she'd been thrilled to realize she could wear it constantly and immediately without having to send it back to the jeweler. During their short ceremony last week, he'd given her its match, a subtler, simpler band without the large diamond.

But far more than the new rings on her left hand, Cora loved sleeping with Robert. She had not spent any more nights at his apartment after she'd agreed to marry him, finding it something of a hassle to get dressed there and not wishing to move her belongings twice, and thus there had been a new thrill in climbing into bed with him night after night now that they were wed. Her initial nerves and shyness had long faded, and she found that she _loved_ to be intimate with him—somehow she had not quite imagined that it would be such terrific fun, and, oh, how much more it made her love Robert each time! Then there was simply the _sleeping_ part of sleeping with him. Although she would never have guessed it when they'd first met, beneath his formal English exterior, Robert was excellent at snuggling. She loved the way he cradled her in his arms, the way she woke up still tucked securely against him, the way his presence warmed her from her heart to her toes, and she could not remember how she had ever been able to sleep alone.

* * *

"Robert, this is gorgeous. It's just…unreal."

They were wandering through Rievaulx Abbey, a crumbling 11th-century ruin not far from Downton. Brilliantly green grass had long ago replaced the old stone floor, and the ceiling of every room was open to the sky. You could walk through towering archways once filled by stained glass windows, and in some places, the walls had fallen so far that all that remained was a vague suggestion of a foundation, a few cornerstones tossed here and there. She'd seen sketches and paintings of England's ruined churches, but to be walking in the midst of one made her feel as though she'd stepped into the pages of an art history textbook.

Robert chuckled. "It _is_ a ruin, you know. This isn't how it's supposed to look. I imagine the original abbey was much more beautiful."

"Oh, I don't know," she said thoughtfully, taking a seat on the remains of what must have once been a supporting column in the abbey's center. "I think there's something rather nice about beauty in ruins, about the way it's _still_ gorgeous, even though it isn't the way it was intended." She paused. "I've always wanted to see one of these. I never imagined I'd live so near to one someday!"

"Do you…like Yorkshire?" he asked, a casualness in his tone that she did not think quite hid his nerves at the question.

She smiled. "I do, very much! It's so pretty—I love the little towns and villages and thatched roofs and the wonderfully green grass and all the sheep and the heather out on the moors. And I love Downton, too, every bit of it."

Robert didn't hide the relief on his face. "So you won't mind moving out here at some point?"

"No, not at all! I can't wait to live in London first—I can't quite believe I'm going to be living in _London_ —but I'll love it out here, too. It's peaceful, and it's beautiful."

"It's not too out in the middle of nowhere for you?"

She laughed. "We're only a half hour from York." He had taken her into the city yesterday, and she had fallen in love with it. "It takes me longer than that to get from my parents' house into downtown Cincinnati…and I don't get to wander a medieval, Roman, Viking city when I get there. This seems like a lovely place to raise our children, too."

"Children?" He grinned, raising his eyebrows. "It's not twins, is it?"

"No! That is, I don't think so." Cora smiled shyly, realizing how little about the future they had discussed in their rush to marry. "It's just…I've always wanted several. I'd love to have the London flat bursting with them."

"We may have to move out to Downton very quickly," he said. "It's got more bedrooms."

"You don't mind, do you?" she asked, nervously turning her new rings.

Robert took a seat next to her, kissing her cheek. "Of course not, darling. Nothing sounds better than more babies with you."

She snuggled into his side, and he slipped his arms around her, holding her with his hand on her belly. His thumb stroked it gently, and she sighed. In the past month, Robert had become very fond of caressing her stomach, seemingly fascinated with the feel of it and the thought that their baby rested inside. She loved him for it.

She had very little of a bump at the moment, and she certainly did not look pregnant yet, but a couple hard inches had added themselves to her stomach, and she knew he could sense them with his hand there. She could not imagine how much more enthralled he would be once she had the full belly of late pregnancy and he could feel the baby's kicks—frankly, she couldn't imagine _herself_ at the end of her pregnancy.

"It's strange," she told him, covering his hand with her own. "I can't imagine what my belly will look like this fall. I think this will all seem so much more real then."

He kissed her again. "You're going to look so beautiful."

She blushed with pleasure at the sentiment, for she doubted it was the adjective she would use. "I can't wait to feel the baby moving." She paused. "What would you like to call him or her?"

"Wow," he said. "I've got no idea. I hadn't—somehow it hadn't occurred to me that we'd need a name."

"Robert!" She could not keep from laughing and pulled back to look at him. "Where did you think it would _get_ a name?"

He grinned sheepishly. This wasn't the first time he'd been taken aback about a normal part of parenthood. "Okay, um…maybe Mary? Or Sybil? I like those names."

Cora wrinkled her nose. "Those are so old-fashioned!"

"Then I'm guessing you don't like Edith, either."

She shook her head. "Ugh, that's _dreadful_. You're not serious, are you?" These sounded like names he was reaching off a 19th-century census.

"I was, but I don't give much thought to names, really…did you have any in mind?"

"Oh, lots! I like Zena, and Adira, and Summer, and Lux, and Jade." She liked modern, unusual names, but if the look of shock on her husband's face was any indication, he did not. Cora laughed. "We may have to compromise." But then she paused. It had not escaped her that his choices had all been girls' names, and thus she had responded in kind. She suspected this was a subconscious attempt on his part to avoid giving the impression that he wanted a son and an heir…which she was sure was the truth of it. She didn't mind. She knew an earl needed an heir.

"But we haven't talked about boys' names," she went on. "Did you have any thoughts on those?"

"Well, he'll be the earl of Grantham someday," Robert said, and she tried to hide her smile. Of course he would be. "So I do think that should be traditional, if you don't mind."

"I don't mind." She imagined he knew more about aristocratic names than she did, and she agreed that there should be a sense of history in the name.

"Probably something a past earl has had," he said. He paused. "Actually…could we name him after my father?"

"Oh, absolutely," she said, feeling immediately that this was the right thing to do without even knowing the name. "What was your father's name?"

"Patrick," he said. "Patrick Crawley."

She nodded. "That's perfect. We'll have another little Patrick Crawley."

"Then we've got the name half settled," Robert said, taking her hand and giving it a squeeze. "A boy will be Patrick. And if you do want to give a girl a nontraditional name, I don't mind."

She smiled. "I really do like Summer."

"Then Summer it is. We don't get much of it up here, you know…you'll see more sun in London than in Yorkshire."

"Yes, London has a reputation as a very sunny city," she said, laughing. "Robert, when we move here more permanently…where will your mother live?" She had wondered this for some time, suspecting, regardless of the size of the house and how much she might come to like the other woman, that she did not want to spend years living under the same roof as her mother-in-law.

"There's a dower house nearby," he told her. "She may move there in the next few months, actually—she's been commenting that she finds the abbey too big and hollow without my father in it."

"But what about your grandmother? Will they share the dower house?" She knew Robert's paternal grandmother was still alive and well.

"Gran doesn't live there," he replied. "Her own mother-in-law was still living in it when my grandfather died and she moved out, so she went to a cottage my family owns in the village—it's known as Crawley House. She didn't want to leave even once the dower house became available, because she says she likes Crawley House better." He grinned. "And it's a good thing, too, because if she and my mum had to be roommates, there would be blood on the sitting room floor very soon."

"Do they not like each other?"

 _"No,"_ he said emphatically. Cora hoped it wasn't a foreshadowing of her own relationship with either woman.

"It's strange to think we're married, and I've never met any of your family."

His face fell. "Perhaps we should have done things differently."

"Oh no! No, I think it's rather romantic how we dashed off to the courthouse," she said with a smile. She'd see the Crawleys all soon enough—Robert's mother had announced that she intended to throw a formal post-wedding reception for them at Downton. "And besides, I'll meet everyone at your mother's party for us this weekend."


	14. Chapter 14

_I suppose I should just be glad my son comes off as so obviously honorable that you felt this was a reasonable chance to take._ Her mother-in-law's comment had been made hours ago, but Cora's hands still trembled with anger when she recalled it…and she'd recalled it numerous times.

Tonight was Violet's reception for the new couple, and she had arrived back at Downton this morning. Most of the dowager countess's day had been spent ordering around the florists and caterers and other professionals who had been hired for what was shaping up to be a terribly grand event, but Robert had introduced her to Cora over lunch.

Cora did not think she had ever met anyone so cold, and she knew she herself had never been regarded with such a disapproving stare. Violet had not been outright rude—indeed, Cora suspected someone so proper had never in her life been _rude_ —but she had made it abundantly clear that it was her belief that Cora had seduced Robert with the intention of getting pregnant so that she might trap him into marriage, gaining a title and an estate in the process. Robert's mention of Cora's original hesitancy to contact him _because_ he was a viscount had been met only with soft laughter, as though Violet had heard these kinds of stories before.

For her part, Cora had protested that she had never expected Robert to marry her and was intensely grateful that he had, but Violet had just smiled knowingly in a way that made Cora want to slap her. (Robert, meanwhile, had been horrified by Cora's speech, telling her as soon as they were away from his mother that he did _not_ want her gratitude. "I _wanted_ to marry you," he said heatedly. "It is for _me_ to be grateful to _you_ for turning your life upside down on the spur of the moment!")

She'd shrugged and brushed the conversation off, quickly changing the subject as she and Robert headed out for a walk in the village. She did not like to think of her marriage in terms of gratitude, regardless of which side it was from. There was nothing unusual about their marriage at all, she preferred to tell herself. They were always going to get married and have children together; it was all just happening a bit sooner and faster than planned.

Cora was now upstairs in the Mercia bedroom, readying herself for the party. Or rather, _planning_ to ready herself for the party—at the moment, she was flopped across the bed _dreading_ the party and trying to convince herself to go and shower. The plan had been to give the impression to the majority of the Crawleys' acquaintances that she and Robert had wed earlier in the winter in New York, but of course that deception couldn't apply easily to closer relatives. How many of Robert's family knew that they had just gotten married a week and a half ago to accommodate her pregnancy? And how many of those would see it like his mother, had been _encouraged_ that way by his mother? The questions would be in the back of her mind with each relative she was introduced to this evening.

How odd, she thought, to dread her own wedding reception. For she supposed that was what this was—it could not have felt less like it, but she doubted the awkward dinner she and Robert and her parents had gone out for after they'd been married in New York had much counted.

Not that Cora was dressed for a wedding reception. She'd seen no point in buying a gown for a short courthouse ceremony—it had seemed silly to wear anything more than a casual knit dress for the occasion. It also didn't seem quite right to buy one merely to wear to a party nearly two weeks after the event—a party where she would know no one, anyway. Her plan had been to wear the red dress she'd used for her Valentine's date with Robert, but she'd realized in a panic two days ago that it no longer fit quite right. While she didn't truly have any belly to speak of at this stage, her midsection had grown thicker and rounder, and every cocktail dress she owned had stretched uncomfortably and unattractively across her front. Prominently displaying her pregnancy was the last thing she'd wanted for tonight, and so she'd rushed out with Robert yesterday to buy something new. He'd taken her back into York, but of course very few special dresses are found in one afternoon of shopping. She'd come home with a loose-fitting, navy blue dress that she didn't particularly like.

 _Don't be so melancholy,_ she admonished herself. She wanted to be excited about tonight. She _meant_ to be excited.

"Darling!" She sat up at the sound of the bedroom door opening, accompanied by Robert's voice. "A package just arrived for you…from Ohio, it looks like." He stepped into the room lugging a large cardboard box, which he set down on the bed.

"Oh," she murmured softly. Cora was in no great hurry to see what was inside—the box was addressed in her mother's handwriting with her parents' return in the upper left, and she suspected she'd been shipped every childhood artifact Martha Levinson could get her hands on to throw out of the house.

Embarrassed at her hurried, "shotgun" wedding, Cora had tried to talk her parents out of flying to New York for the ceremony, suggesting they come to visit her in London over the summer instead, and then perhaps again next Christmas after the baby was born. They'd agreed to the visits to England, but they had also absolutely insisted they see her married, and thus she'd endured an awkward two days with them.

Her mother, it was clear, was nothing short of horrified at her daughter's situation. It was not that Martha was overly conservative—indeed, she'd more than once told Cora she was too hesitant about sex and that her plan to sleep with one man only was simply unrealistic in today's world. She was thus not the slightest bit disappointed in the loss of Cora's virginity, which in her opinion should have happened several years earlier. Rather, she was appalled at Cora's foolishness in letting herself conceive, and much of her time in New York had been spent berating her daughter about how very many contraception options had been available to her—as though the deed could be undone if they all simply wished hard enough. She had also made it quite clear that she thought that Cora was far, far too young to have and raise a baby and that the plan to marry Robert and run off to the U.K. with him was nothing short of mental. "You've got your whole _life_ ahead of you, Cora," she'd said in a tone of disgust when it had become clear her daughter would not be talked out of the nuptials. "You're _twenty-four_."

Worse for Cora, though, had been her father's mournful silence throughout much of the visit. She was used to not seeing eye-to-eye with her mother, and while it was a painful occurrence on her "wedding day," it was a feeling she was well-versed in dealing with. Disappointing her father, however, was a new and deeply unsettling experience, and her heart had broken at the sadness in his eyes when he regarded her.

"I'm sorry," she had murmured that evening on the walk he had suggested they take alone. "I'm sorry for the mess I've made, and I know how disappointed you must be."

Isidor had taken hold of her arm, forcing her to stop and look at him, for she had delivered her apology to the pavement. _"No,"_ he had said, with a sharpness that surprised her. "You have _not_ made a mess, and I am _not_ disappointed."

"I can see it in your eyes," she had protested, but he had shaken his head.

"What you see in my eyes, princess, is grief that my girl is moving thousands of miles away—not disappointment in what she's done or the woman she is."

Cora could not have felt less like a woman—having to explain herself to her parents had made her feel like a teenager who had been very stupid on prom night. "I've acted like a sixteen-year-old," she had argued softly, but Isidor had taken her chin in his hand, raising her downcast eyes to meet his.

"No, you have not, my dear," he had said firmly. "You have acted like an adult who has made a very grown-up decision to do a very grown-up thing in marrying Robert and starting a family with him, and I could not be any prouder."

She had cried then, feeling her heart lighten at his words and his sincerity, but it could not have been clearer that her mother did not share the sentiment, and that disapproval still stung days later and an ocean away.

"I brought scissors up with me," she heard Robert say excitedly, drawing her back to the present. He was clearly too pleased at the arrival of a mysterious package to notice the consternation on his wife's face. He pointed to the postage sticker. "It must be quite important, because your parents paid to get it here very quickly."

He tried to hand her the scissors, but she shook her head. "You open it."

It was clear that no instruction could have pleased him more, and Robert enthusiastically attacked the box and its packing tape, opening the flaps to reveal a slim, sealed envelope resting on the white tissue paper that hid the rest of the contents. _Cora_ had been scrawled across the front, and, hesitantly, she picked it up and ripped it open.

 _My darling,_ the note inside read, _your father told me on the way home that you are troubled at the thought that I am disappointed in you. Please know, dearest, that nothing could be further from the truth! I could never be disappointed in you, never. Rather, you make me very proud in all of your decisions, and I will be very proud to see you as a mother yourself later this year._

 _What I was was disappointed_ for _you, out of a fear that you would not have the life you've dreamed of, that you would not have the future you've worked so hard for. But more than anything else, I want you to be happy…and you are old enough to know what will make you so. I hope that marriage to Robert will indeed make you happy, and as long as it does, there will be no reason for me to be disappointed at all._

 _I did fear that your wedding itself was not a happy occasion for you—not because of whom you were marrying or the decision you were making, but because of the nature of the ceremony. I know Robert's mother is hosting a reception for you in England, and I hope this gift will make that event a bit closer to the wedding I know you have always dreamed of._

 _Cora, I love you._

"What does she say?" Robert asked, but Cora folded the letter, not sure she wanted to share it.

"She's…proud. And she wants us to be happy," she said softly.

"Are you going to open the rest of it?" The forced casualness in his tone made her smile. He was as eager as a little boy at the thought of a present, and it wasn't even his.

She, on the other hand, was hesitant, for now she had a wild suspicion of what this might be, and she was almost frightened at the thought of discovering otherwise. Taking a deep breath, she lifted the tissue paper, to reveal folds of soft, white silk.

"What is it, darling?" she heard Robert ask softly as she felt a tear slip down her face.

"A wedding dress," she whispered. "She's sent me a wedding dress."

* * *

"Oh, Cora, you look so beautiful!" said Robert's sister, Rosamund, who had come upstairs to help her dress, for Cora had not wanted him to see her before she was entirely ready.

Cora saw her own cheeks grow pink with pleasure in the full-length mirror. "I do love it," she said, studying the dress. "I actually can't imagine that I would have chosen anything else if I'd done the shopping myself." As touched as she had been when she'd realized what her mother had sent her, she had briefly feared that the gown would be her mother's style, a gigantic monstrosity of lace and tulle and poof that looked as though it were wearing her. But it hadn't been: Martha had selected a dress she would never have encouraged her daughter to wear, but it was one hundred percent Cora.

The gown was straight and simple, getting its femininity from the soft flounce of its light silk fabric, rather than from the volume of its skirts. There was a loose-fitting empire waist that both accommodated and disguised her slight weight gain and a thin white sash that tied just below her chest. Above this sash, the silk fabric was covered in ornate lace which extended past the top of the dress to form sheer, delicate cap sleeves. The lace appeared again at her feet, peaking out for a short train. Her dress was soft and romantic, at once both elegant and casual, and she had fallen completely in love with it.

"Your mother must know your tastes very well," Rosamund said, and Cora nodded, considering that perhaps Martha truly did.

"Your family…" Cora began, unsure how to phrase it. She liked Rosamund so far, and she did not want to make an enemy so early by seeming to complain about Robert's mother. "That is, those who will be here tonight…do most of them know I'm pregnant?"

Rosamund shook her head. "No, I don't think the news has been widely shared yet. And you can't tell in that dress, if that's what you're worried about. I doubt it would be apparent in any outfit at this stage, really—and even once your belly's visible, I think you'll have at least a couple months in the 'maybe she's just had one biscuit too many' stage, if you don't mind my saying so."

Cora giggled. "No, I don't mind, and I suspect you're right. So…they don't know how quickly we married?"

"No, Cora, no one knows you're up the duff and rushed to the altar immediately when you found out." Cora knew she likely would have taken offense at the sentence, and the blunt way it had been delivered, under most circumstances, but there was a warmth in Rosamund's tone and her smile that made Cora feel she was being laughed with and not at, and she smiled in return. "That is," Rosamund continued after a thoughtful pause, "I imagine my grandmother must know. She'll be late tonight—doesn't like to run the risk of arriving when there are only a few others and having to talk to my mother," she said wryly. "But I'm sure Robert would have given her all the details."

"Of course," Cora said, leaning into the mirror for a final check of her make-up to give herself an air of nonchalance. But inside, her stomach was suddenly churning. She suspected that the elder dowager countess would be far more dragon-like than Violet, and she could not imagine an aristocrat in her eighties smiling on an out-of-wedlock pregnancy.

"May I tell you something?" Rosamund asked lightly, and Cora nodded, dreading what she might hear. "Don't be ashamed of your pregnancy. You—"

"I'm not ashamed!" Cora burst out, her cheeks reddening.

Rosamund waved her protest away. "Or embarrassed, or shy, or whatever it is you are about it. You've got nothing to be ashamed of. You and Robert love each other very much, and you're going to have a beautiful baby together."

"It's only that I think—people might—the timing…"

"Oh, I understand it isn't ideal. Not what you would have planned. But think of it this way: you know going into your marriage that you can have children. You'll never have to worry otherwise."

At twenty-four, the question of whether or not she was able to conceive had simply never entered Cora's head, and she was taken aback at her sister-in-law's suggestion.

"I can't," Rosamund said in answer to Cora's silent question. "Duke and I found out a few months ago."

"I'm sorry," Cora said, embarrassed at how ridiculous her own nerves and hesitancy must seem. "I didn't mean to—"

"No, I'm not offended," Rosamund said, and she truly did not look it. "I just hate to see you anything less than ecstatic about your baby, because you absolutely should be."

"I am," Cora said quietly. "And I will try to remember that." But deep down, she knew her happiness and her thankfulness for the life inside her would not make her squirm any less in the presence of Robert's grandmother.

"Are you ready to go down?" Rosamund asked her now, and Cora detected an air of Robert's childlike enthusiasm in her tone. "I'm sure Robert's wearing a hole in the carpet, pacing as he waits to see you."

"I am, I think," Cora said, taking a deep breath to steady her nerves. Robert would be with her. His grandmother and all the rest of them didn't matter as long as he was with her.

* * *

Robert was indeed pacing on the landing of the grand staircase, and his eyes snapped up to her immediately as she began to descend.

"Cora!" he called out, and there was such love and joy in his voice that she thought her heart might burst at the sound. "Oh, darling…you're beautiful."

She smiled so broadly she thought her face might crack. Oh, how glad she was for the dress! This was near enough to walking down the aisle and seeing Robert at the end of it.

"So you're pleased with your overseas bride, Lord Grantham?" she asked, laughing softly.

"My darling, I am so much more than pleased." She had reached the step above the landing, and his arms slipped around her, drawing her to him for a soft kiss.

"You don't look so bad yourself," she said when they had finished, running her fingers lightly along his cheek. "I didn't know you were going to wear a tux!"

"I wasn't, but then when your dress showed up, I figured I had better take my own attire to the next level." He kissed her again. "Although I'm still going to be terribly outshone by my new wife. You do look so, so beautiful, Cora." He gently caressed her stomach and lowered his voice. "And all the more beautiful because I know you're carrying our baby."

She smiled down at his hand, for she did so love this habit, before she pushed it away. "You must not touch me there tonight, or they'll all guess our secret."

He sighed and embraced her again, whispering in her ear, "Would that be so very terrible? My mother's given them the impression we were married shortly after the new year. I wouldn't mind announcing that we're expecting tonight."

Cora shook her head. "No, I don't want it shared just yet." She knew the pregnancy was no longer their exclusive secret, with close friends and family already aware, but the news still felt too fragile and wonderful and private for it to be spread abroad. "I…don't want to share the baby with the world right now. I like it being _ours_."

He laid a kiss just above her eyebrow. "As you wish, my darling."

"Robert! Cora!" Robert pulled away immediately at the sound of his mother's voice, and Cora sighed. She would have liked to have gone on being held, alone on the staircase, for just a few more minutes.

"There you are!" Violet, who was standing at the bottom of the stairs, stopped short as her eyes took in the couple. "That's a lovely white dress, my dear," she said, lingering ever-so-slightly on the word _white_.

Cora felt herself flush, but Robert took her hand and said proudly, "Yes, it is, isn't it? Cora makes a beautiful bride."

"There are quite a few people in the drawing room already," Violet said, pointedly ignoring Robert's statement.

Cora would not have wanted to admit it, but the slight did sting, and she felt Robert squeeze her hand in apology as they followed his mother across the great hall toward the drawing room, where she could hear the low hum of conversation.

* * *

AN: This has nothing whatsoever to do with this story, but does anyone have any favorite books set in Australia or New Zealand? (I prefer historical fiction, but I'll read contemporary stuff, too.) I'm heading down under in January, and I love reading books set in a destination before I travel there, but I'm having trouble finding much for that region. Please PM me if you've got suggestions. Thanks!


	15. Chapter 15

AN: Thanks so much to all of you who provided book recommendations last week! I've got a great list. I knew I could count on you guys! :-)

* * *

The evening went far more nicely than Cora had imagined, she and Robert moving from relative to village resident to aristocrat as they circled through the dining room and then the great hall, where the growing crowd eventually spilled. As cold as Violet was to her, Cora could not fault her for skimping on their reception. The older woman had ordered more elaborate floral arrangements than Cora would have ever envisioned for her wedding, a live orchestra had been hired, and Cora suspected the wedding cake rivalled the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's.

She had not met anyone who was anything short of gracious and welcoming, with most of Robert's extended family eager to hear about life in New York, and she had begun to relax when he suddenly said, "Oh, my gran is here now! You must come meet her."

Cora nodded, feeling her stomach knot and her spine stiffen with dread, and she let him lead her across the great hall. A petite old woman had just come in and was handing a mink coat to Charles Carson, the household manager whose life seemed to revolve around Downton, its special events, and its public openings. She had perfectly coiffured blonde hair, finely manicured nails, a strand of pearls around her neck, and a sleek, silk, icy blue evening gown. Everything inch of her screamed elegance and class, and Cora was certain that she would not measure up to the elder dowager countess's surely-exacting standards.

She hung back as Robert greeted his grandmother and kissed her, and she tried to smile when Robert turned to her. "Gran, let me introduce my wife, Cora," he said. "Cora, this is my grandmother, Mary Crawley."

"Cora," the old lady said with a smile, as though testing out the name. She took the younger woman's hand and squeezed it lightly. "It's lovely to meet you."

"Is it Lady Mary or Lady Grantham?" Cora asked. The latter, she thought, but she felt she was drowning in a sea of titles.

Mary smiled warmly. "It's neither for you, dear. I'd like it much better if you just called me Gran, as Robert and Rosamund do."

"I…I'm sorry?" Cora had been holding herself rigid, waiting for whatever veiled insult she was sure would come, and all she could think at first was that she must not have heard properly.

Another smile—one that reached her eyes in a way Violet's never did. "Call me Gran, my dear, if you don't mind—if you don't think your own grandmother minds."

It had been nearly ten years since Cora had had anyone alive to call Gran or Grandma or anything similar, but she could not imagine either of her grandmothers objecting—the position was, by its very nature, not an exclusive one.

"Oh, of course not," she said. "Of course not. I'm happy to call you Gran." And she was, truly—the title stirred something in her that felt very much like home.

Mary's eyes were slowly traveling from Cora's head to her toes and back up again, but there was nothing in her gaze that made Cora squirm. "You look lovely," she said approvingly. "Really lovely." She turned to Robert. "She's so lovely I'm not sure if I'm impressed or shocked. You do realize, my boy, that this woman is out of your league."

Robert laughed. "I wouldn't have married anyone who wasn't."

"Then you'll forgive me," Mary said, her eyes sparkling playfully as she dropped her voice to just above a whisper, "for hoping that _the baby_ looks just like your bride."

"I hope you don't mind," Robert said quickly, "that my grandmother knows, too."

Cora shook her head. "Oh no, I would have expected that." And she now felt she could breathe again—it wasn't, as the back of her mind had momentarily suggested, that no one had bothered to tell Mary about the pregnancy; it was that she truly did not mind.

"Yes, Robert's told me you're going to make me a great-grandmother, my dear," the old lady said, laying her hand on Cora's arm. "I can't tell you how glad I was to hear it—I'm no longer pushing eighty; I'm dragging it. Robert's mother says you're due in November?"

Cora nodded. "Yes, November 8th."

"I will try, then, to make it through the autumn."

Mary looked like the sort of woman who would easily see her hundredth birthday, but Cora wondered briefly if her attractive appearance were not masking some terminal illness. Before she could react, Robert grinned and said, "Gran likes us to believe she'll be dead next Tuesday, but the reality is that she's planning to bury us all."

Mary smiled. "Yes, and I hope to see a great many more miniature Roberts and Coras before my time is up. But tell me, my dear—how have you been feeling? Have you been well?"

Cora nodded. "Very well—tired, and a bit of morning sickness, but it hasn't been bad at all."

"I hope my grandson has taken very good care of you."

"Oh, he has, he has. Robert's been marvelous," she said, blushing at the thought of the many mornings they had spent curled around each other in bed this week.

"See that it stays this way, Robert," Mary said, fixing him with a sharp look. "I want to hear that you've taken the best care of Cora." She turned back to the bride. "And England? Have you enjoyed England thus far?"

"Oh, very much, yes." She still could not shake the feeling that she was on vacation, rather than living here. "Yorkshire is breathtaking."

"Well, we're rather partial," Mary said. "I hope you'll be down from London often on the weekends this spring and summer, and that I'll see quite a bit of you both—I'm just down in the village."

Cora nodded again, eager at the suggestion. "I'm sure we'll visit quite a bit."

"I'm glad." Mary kissed her cheek. "I should let you get on to your other guests, but welcome to Downton, Cora. It's lovely to have another granddaughter, and lovely to have another American around."

"Another American?" Cora asked before Mary could step away. Did Robert perhaps have a cousin who had also married an American?

Mary raised an eyebrow. "Did Robert not tell you?" She clucked her tongue at the sheepish expression on her grandson's face. "That boy _never_ thinks of the family history. His great-great-grandmother—the grandmother of my late husband—was an American. An American heiress, and it's thanks to her that we're standing here now! The Crawleys only retained this estate through her fortune."

"What?" Cora had heard of such stories, but it had never occurred to her that the history of the American buccaneers might apply to the family she had married into.

"I never really think about it," Robert began, but his grandmother shushed him.

"I'll tell you all about Helen over a cup of tea someday," Mary promised, patting Cora's arm as she left them. "I remember her quite well."

"She's _lovely_ ," Cora said as soon as Mary had gone. "Your gran is really lovely."

He raised his eyebrows. "Was that not what you were expecting?"

"I suppose I thought she…" She trailed off, not wanting to say _she would be like your mother_ , thus implying that she did _not_ find his mother equally pleasant.

But then Robert grinned. "You thought she'd be like my mum, didn't you?"

"Well, I—"

"I know my mother's difficult. But she and my grandmother are night and day—why else wouldn't they be able to stand each other?"

"I'd wondered if that was merely because they were _too_ much alike," Cora admitted, making Robert laugh.

 _"No,"_ he said firmly. "It's definitely _not_ because they're alike—and you don't ever want to let either of _them_ hear you suggest that!"

* * *

If her introduction to Robert's grandmother had been the highlight of Cora's evening, a conversation with his mother after the guests had departed was certainly the worst of it. As the catering staff were packing up, she was thanking Violet profusely for a reception that had been far lovelier than anything she would have planned in Ohio.

"You're not sad you didn't have a wedding at home?" Robert asked, a theme he had returned to many times before and after their civil ceremony.

Cora shook her head. "I wouldn't do any of this over again. Even if I did miss being married under the chuppahor having you break a glass."

Robert had grinned at her first sentence, but his smile faltered at her final words, and she caught a slight twitch in her mother-in-law's features.

"Chuppah?" Violet repeated.

"It's the canopy the bride and groom are married under in a Jewish ceremony," Cora said, telling herself Violet's expression was confusion at the Hebrew word, not disapproval.

"I am aware of what it is, Cora. What I am not aware of is why it would have ever had any role in your wedding."

Had Robert not mentioned her background? She glanced at her husband to find that he was newly fascinated with the carpet, and she knew instantly that he had not. How could he have thought it so insignificant? How could he have left her in the position of surprising his mother with this news?

"I _am_ Jewish," she said plainly.

This was clearly the conclusion Violet had already reached, for she did not blink. "So I gathered. Robert, I take it you are not nearly as surprised to hear this as I am. Why didn't Cora's faith ever come up in conversation?"

He shrugged. "There was so much else to tell you."

Violet's nostrils flared, and Cora imagined she was remembering just what else her son had had to tell her when he'd called with the news of his sudden engagement.

Cora was angry with Robert for letting her unwittingly spring this on her new mother-in-law, but that would be dealt with later. She was far hotter over the suggestion of anti-Semitism from Violet and intended to meet it head on.

"Does it _matter_ than I'm Jewish?" she asked pointedly, raising her chin.

"No," Violet said, her voice equally pointed. "Given everything that's already been turned on its head here, I cannot imagine how anything else, including your religion, could possibly matter."

Cora felt her face burning, and she joined Robert in lowering her eyes to the ground.

* * *

"Why didn't you tell her?" Cora asked softly as she stepped back into the bedroom, her make-up removed and her nightgown on. She wanted him to say that he'd forgotten, in the rush of their marriage, to mention to his mother that she was Jewish. It did not please her to think he had so easily forgotten such a large part of her, but she could tell herself that it was a sign of his great acceptance of the fact, and it was preferable to any other alternative—such as that he was ashamed of her Judaism.

Robert, who was sitting up in bed scrolling through Facebook, set his phone down on the bedside table. "Well, there was so much else to tell her," he said, echoing what he'd told his mother earlier.

"Was there really?" she asked, moving to the foot of the bed and standing by the bedpost. "Were you really giving her so many details about my life that you couldn't squeeze in one of the more important ones?"

"Well, it wasn't exactly how _much_ I had to tell her; it was…"

"It was the nature of the things you had to tell her." He did not respond, and so she pushed further. "What all did you tell her, Robert?"

He sighed. "I first told her about you when I came home in February. I told her I was dating a young American woman who was in graduate school at NYU, and I told her you were from Ohio."

When he didn't continue, she asked, "Was that all?"

"That day, yes. And then of course a couple weeks later, I was calling to tell her that we were expecting a baby and getting married in New York, and that you were returning to the U.K. with me."

"None of these seem like such detail-packed conversations that you couldn't have worked in that I'm Jewish."

He sighed again. "It wasn't that I couldn't work it in, Cora; it was that I was already asking my mother to accept a lot."

 _"'Accept a lot'?"_

"Don't take it that way—"

"What 'way'? That I'm a completely unacceptable wife for you?"

"No! It's just—"

"It's just what? That you had to tell her that your middle-class, unemployed, American girlfriend was knocked up, and you were going to marry her…and you felt that the last thing you needed to add to this conversation was that your girlfriend was also a _Jew_?"

"It wasn't like that! It was…I wanted her to…I wanted this to be easy for you. Or easi _er_ ," he said quickly in response to the thunderous look on Cora's face. "I know none of this is _easy_. I thought…I wanted her to be as gracious as possible. I didn't…I didn't want to give her extrareasons to dislike you."

"And that's what my religion and my ethnicity is?" She knew she was raising her voice, but she didn't much care. "A reason to dislike me?"

"No! Darling, I was afraid my mother would be unkind to you, and—"

"And you did an _excellent_ job averting that," she snapped sarcastically. "Although I don't see why she _wouldn't_ hate me, when, as you say, you've already given her _so many reasons to dislike me_."

"Cora, be _reasonable_. My mother doesn't hate you, and she doesn't have a list of reasons to dislike you. I–I didn't mean it that way. I didn't mean any of this this way! My mother's difficult, as I've said; she's rarely warm and fuzzy with anyone; and yes, she would have preferred for me to marry an Englishwoman. But—"

"An Englishwoman who also wasn't knocked up."

He sighed. "Darling…"

"Don't call me that," she spat, feeling suddenly very, very weary. "I'm going to bed." And with no further comment, she turned and made her way to her side, climbed in, flicked her light off, and yanked the covers over herself. She lay stiffly with her back to Robert, as near to the edge of the bed as she could get—she would have preferred for him to find somewhere else to sleep, but she was tired and did not want to suggest it and have another argument.

 _Another_ argument. This, she realized, had been their first, and she felt her throat clog with unshed tears at the thought. She _hated_ how emotional pregnancy had made her! And how easily angered…she suspected, in some distant part of herself, that a more rational Cora might have been calmer, might have been able to shrug this off as an attempt to shield her that had backfired, might have understood that Robert was overwhelmed by all of this too and that his neglecting to tell his mother she was Jewish meant nothing more than that he had neglected to tell his mother she was Jewish.

"Cora?" he whispered hesitantly in the darkness. She said nothing, but he seemed to take silence as permission to continue. "Will you at least tell me what 'knocked up' means?"

She thought of Rosamund's strange choice of phrase earlier— _up the duff_ —and realized that _knocked up_ must be an American expression. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry. She compromised with half a sob, and then, her voice wavering, she murmured, "Pregnant."

"Oh, sweetheart," she heard him say as she felt his hand caress her shoulder, and then the floodgates opened. Crying in earnest now, she rolled over to face him, and he gathered her in his arms. Part of her wanted to stay angry, covering her hurt with her fury, but more of her wanted his comfort.

"Darling, please don't cry," he pleaded, kissing her hair as she laid her head against his chest. She took a deep breath, trying to calm her tears, concentrating on the hand stroking gently through her curls. "I'm sorry; I'm terribly sorry," Robert whispered, giving her another kiss.

She shook her head. "Don't be," she managed after a moment. "It's all right. It–it doesn't matter."

And, with Robert's arms around her, as she breathed in his scent and felt his hand rubbing steadily up and down her back, it truly did not seem to.


	16. Chapter 16

AN: Sorry this is just now going up! It's been written for awhile, but I just completely forgot to post this morning. (I was distracted by last night's Halloween festivities, and I went to bed at like 3 then slept the morning away. Happy Halloween, everyone!)

* * *

Robert would not have fully awakened when he rolled over had it not been for Cora's absence. But as he stirred in his sleep, his body became instantly aware that hers was no longer pressed against it, and he jolted awake.

 _She's in the bathroom, mate,_ his sleepy mind told him as he closed his eyes—although he knew he wouldn't drift off again until Cora was back. They'd been married just over a month now, and he had grown so accustomed to her quiet breathing and her warm weight against him that he suspected he would be up all night if he were ever sent out of town on business.

It was now the week before Easter, the cold of March having given way to a warmer, sunnier April than Robert could remember in recent years, and it pleased Robert to think that nature itself wanted to match the happiness in his and Cora's lives. Their first couple weeks in London had been very happy ones indeed, and on Saturday, they and the Painswicks would be driving back to Downton to celebrate the holiday with his mother.

To his great relief, Cora seemed to love London. She was not working—she didn't intend to work after the baby was born, and they both saw little point in wading through the paperwork to give her the legal right to work in the U.K. and then searching for a job when she would be quitting in a matter of months. He had feared she would be bored while he was at work himself, but that had thus far not been the case as she'd been using the time to slowly explore the city, a task that she assured him would have occupied her for far longer than what remained of her pregnancy. He had also worried she would be lonely, but she did not seem to mind the solitude of her days, and she had been quickly scooped up by Rosamund into her army of girlfriends so that he had more than once been at odds with his sister over who would "get" to spend a Saturday or an evening with Cora.

And then, of course, there was the baby, for whom Robert and Cora had spent many a night or weekend afternoon planning and shopping. He was not sure what made him happier—his own excitement about the impending arrival, or observing Cora's. They had heard the rapid thumping of the baby's heartbeat for the first time at her doctor's appointment on Friday, and she had not stopped talking about it since.

She was also, he knew, beginning to feel better, her morning sickness and fatigue slowly lifting as she neared the end of her third month, but his need to take care of her was almost overwhelming, and his tendency to worry was not fading.

In fact, it was precisely what he was doing now. Time was always a strange thing in bed in the dark, but Robert was beginning to think that more minutes seemed to have passed than would be necessary for a trip to the bathroom. Where was she? He half sat up and reached for his phone on the bedside table, learning that it was 12:03 a.m.—the first minutes of Wednesday morning. Not so late, then. Perhaps Cora had gotten up to read, or gone for a snack or a drink.

 _Whatever she is doing does not require supervision,_ he told himself sternly.

But what if something was _wrong_? What if she had gotten up for a glass of water and passed out in the kitchen? What if she'd suddenly gotten terribly ill, too sick to call out for him or make it back to their bedroom? What if…

He sighed. He was getting up and looking for her…and when he found her healthy and calm, he would just claim he'd gone for a drink himself.

As soon as he stepped into the hall, he was aware of the faint light coming from the front room, where he found Cora seated on the sofa, her back against the armrest and her knees up in front of her. She was looking down, her brow furrowed, and his first thought was that she had another of the headaches that had bothered her over the last few weeks and had gotten up so as not to disturb him.

"Cora? Are you all right?" he asked softly, intending to coax her to lie down again.

She started, jerking around to face him. "Robert! I didn't hear you get up."

"Sorry," he said sheepishly. He saw now that her eyes had been downcast not with pain, but to view the iPad she was clutching. "What were you looking at?"

"I…Facebook," she said hesitantly.

"In the middle of the night?"

She shrugged and looked down again, closing the iPad case and setting it on the table in front of the couch. "I couldn't sleep."

That was not like her—tired from her pregnancy, she was asleep most nights as soon as her head hit the pillow. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

She sighed, and he knew there was. It could not be serious, or she would not be sitting up and calmly conversing, but he felt his muscles tense anyway at the suggestion that she was not well. He took a seat next to her, prepared to wait for her to speak, and she stretched her legs over his lap.

"It's only…"

"It's only what?" He began rubbing his thumb over the sole of one of her bare feet.

Cora dropped her eyes, looking down at the hand resting on her belly. She'd grown very fond of laying her hand against the baby, a subconscious gesture that always made him smile. The few extra inches she'd had when they'd married had grown into the slightest of bumps—it was not apparent in looser clothes, but any shirts or dresses that clung close to her body displayed the new curve. She was, in his opinion, absolutely glowing most days…but there was nothing radiant in her expression tonight.

"I don't want you to think I'm unhappy," she began quietly. "Because I'm not, and I really am happy in England, and you've been so wonderful. But…"

"But?"

"But—oh, Robert, I'm so _homesick_!"

"For…New York?" Cora had not lived in Cincinnati for some time now.

"No! For my family…for fitting in, and for everything being familiar. But tonight, most of all for being Jewish!"

The beginning of her statement made perfect sense, for he had felt it all himself while living in Manhattan, but the last sentence threw him. "You're still Jewish," he said—idiotically, he would later reflect.

"Oh, never mind!" Cora jerked her foot away. "Please just go back to bed!"

She reached for the iPad, but he caught her arm. "I'm sorry," he said softly. "Tell me what you meant."

She froze, as though deciding whether to answer him, and then at last she settled back onto the couch, drawing her knees up to her chest. "Think about what tonight is," she whispered.

"Tuesday," he said slowly. "The eleventh of April…um…"

"And what's happening this weekend?" she prompted.

"We're going to Downton for Easter…do you mind celebrating Easter?"

"No, but what have we skipped?"

He stared at her blankly. "It's Passover, Robert," she said, irritation creeping into her voice again. "Passover always starts before Easter, with two seder dinners, and tonight was second seder. I managed to not think about it last night, but then I got up this morning and my brother had photos all over Facebook, and tonight when I laid down all I could think about was how it was going on without me in Cincinnati—because I _always_ flew home for Passover—and I couldn't sleep."

"Darling, we could have sent you home," he said, wishing he'd known in time.

Cora shook her head. "I can't go home for every holiday. I don't feel like traveling that far again anyway, not right now."

"What if you Skyped—"

"That would make it worse," she snapped. "I don't need to watch them recite the prayers live while I sit in London; it's bad enough knowing it's going on."

He sensed that she was annoyed with him, that this was somehow his fault, and he could not help but feel that her anger was unjust—she had, after all, _agreed_ to move here. "What would you like me to do?" he asked, keeping his own voice even.

"What would I like you to do? _Notice_ , Robert! I would settle for just _notice_! I'm in the middle of a _major_ holiday, and you haven't even noticed. You're too busy making Easter plans for it to occur to you that there _might_ be a Jewish celebration at the same time!"

"Did you tell me Passover was coming?" He couldn't remember her mentioning it, and if she hadn't, his first reaction was that this was very unfair. How was he supposed to know when Jewish holidays occurred if his Jewish wife didn't give him some sort of warning?

"Do I expect _you_ to tell _me_ when Christmas and Easter are coming?"

"No, but those are advertised all over! You–you can't possibly miss them; they're national holidays!"

"Jewish holidays aren't exactly kept under lock and key by rabbis, Robert. Most calendars list them—for heaven's sake, Passover and Hanukkah and Rosh Hashanah, which I am now _fully_ prepared for you to also skip, are probably on your office calendar! You also carry a phone with internet access literally everywhere you go. Did it ever occur to you that, in marrying a Jew, maybe googling the dates of Jewish holidays might be worthwhile?"

It hadn't, and he was suddenly embarrassed. He had given Cora's background very little thought at all—he was always happy to hear about Judaism, but he fully expected her to bring the information to him. He would never have thought to go looking for any on his own.

"I'm going back to bed," she said, before he could formulate an apology. "I'm tired, and I can't think about this anymore."

The Passover debacle was the first thing on Robert's mind when he woke the next morning—just as it had been the last thing he'd thought of before he had finally fallen asleep. He felt, as he breakfasted and showered and shaved, as though he had accidentally missed Cora's birthday…and all the worse, he'd done it when she was naturally already homesick and aching for something familiar. Passover was, as he managed to recall from their conversation about holidays in December, one of her favorite holidays, with two massive seder dinners laid out by Martha and feasted on by the whole Levinson family.

Yes, Cora could have, and probably should have, reminded him that it was coming and suggested they observe it together, but that wasn't the point, was it? She shouldn't have had to remind him. The simple knowledge that of course she had her own holidays should have been enough to push him to find out what was when.

Cora usually slept through his own alarm, and thus it had become their habit for him to wake her himself on his way out the door, sharing a short kiss goodbye. However, he returned to the bedroom after his shower to find her sitting up in bed, red-eyed and fully awake.

"Oh, Robert, I'm sorry," she said immediately. "I wasn't fair last night; I haven't been fair at all. It's my holiday; I shouldn't be waiting for you to suggest we celebrate. I should have said something; I shouldn't have assumed you'd know—I knew you wouldn't know—"

He winced inwardly at that as he went to her. "No, you shouldn't have to." He kissed her cheek and gave her shoulders a gentle squeeze. "I should have known, darling. I should have asked you. I should have just thought about it." If he _had_ given it a moment's thought, he suspected he would have remembered that the Last Supper, which had occurred just days before Easter, had been a Passover meal.

Cora shook her head. "I should _help_ you think, though."

He laughed at that, relieved she wasn't still upset. "You won't have to in the future. I won't let this happen again. Happy Passover, darling." He kissed her on the lips this time and then bent down to kiss her belly, as he'd taken to doing every morning, feeling her stomach vibrate with the soft giggle she always gave as he did so.

"We'll get this right by the time you're here, Summer," he said, giving Cora's bump a soft caress and drawing another giggle from her. He'd taken to addressing the baby as Summer, still hoping with all his heart for a little girl that was a copy of her mother. "I promise you'll have a very nice first Passover."

* * *

"Have a good evening, love," Rosamund said on Friday afternoon, leaning over to kiss her cheek.

"You, too," Cora said, reaching for the handle on the passenger door of her sister-in-law's car. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Rosamund laughed, her eyes twinkling in a way that made Cora wonder whether the older girl knew something she didn't. "Yes, tomorrow."

Cora smiled as she got out. "Thanks for driving."

Rosamund had been off work for Good Friday, and they'd spent the afternoon shopping. Robert was off today, too, but he'd encouraged her to go on, promising he'd have dinner ready for her for a change when she got home.

He'd been very sweet the last couple days, she thought as she entered their apartment building, and she knew he still felt terribly guilty over Passover. She blamed herself for that—the rational, sane thing to do would have been to mention it to him in advance and then prepare a seder dinner for them to share on Monday and Tuesday evenings, but she'd childishly set him the unfair test of figuring it out on his own, a test she'd known all along he would fail. But, if she were honest with herself, she was still a bit troubled over the way he'd handled (or rather, _not_ handled) her ethnicity with his mother, and she _was_ increasingly homesick for her homeland and her family and even her cat, for she'd chosen not to put Sarah through the several weeks of state quarantine required when moving an animal to the U.K. and had left her with a friend. She liked London, and she loved being married to Robert, and she wouldn't have wished to change any of it, but it was _strange_ to suddenly find herself living in a foreign country, and the coming holiday had made her want to wallow in self-pity, rather than attempt her own celebration, which could not possibly have felt like home.

And none of that was Robert's fault.

She wished Passover _had_ occurred to him, but more than that, she wished she'd just taken care of a celebration. But the two seder nights were over now, as she'd told Robert, and they would make up for it next year, as he'd told her. Next year, with their new baby, she thought, smiling as she stepped out of the elevator on the second floor, her hand going immediately to her stomach.

Cora let herself in to the apartment, immediately breathing in the delicious scent of meat that she imagined had been slowly cooking for hours. But then…she caught a hint of the herbs she'd always known at Passover, as though they'd been mixed in with whatever Robert was working on. It was her imagination, she knew, her memory transforming whatever spices he'd been using into the bitter herbs of her childhood. A wave of homesickness swept over her.

She made her way to the kitchen, looking for Robert in a subconscious attempt to cheer herself. The kitchen table had been set behind him—formally, and with four places instead of two, and scattered with dishes he'd covered in aluminum foil to hold in the heat—and he was working the cork free from a bottle of wine, but she was only aware of two things. First, the light scent of matzo ball soup emanating from the steaming pot on the stove; and second, the symbolic seder plate, arranged perfectly, sitting in the middle of their table.

"Robert?"

He jumped, looking up immediately. "Cora! You're home—I didn't hear you come in."

"What are you doing?" she asked softly, although her heart already knew.

"Opening the sparkling grape juice," he said, as though he prepared a seder every night. "There's no alcohol in this—you can drink it."

She shook her head. "No, I mean with all this."

"What does it look like I'm doing?" he said, smiling. "I'm getting a belated seder ready for us—and the Painswicks; Rosamund said she'd drop you off, park, and—"

But he was cut off by Cora throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him.

* * *

Cora was flopped across the bed in the Mercia room attempting to read a novel, and failing badly, as the overheard conversation between her mother-in-law and Robert's aunt replayed itself in her mind.

It was Saturday afternoon, and she and Robert had arrived at Downton about an hour ago. Rosamund and Duke were supposed to be here soon as well, but Cora had quickly learned that you could not count on Ros to arrive when she said she would, and thus she was not expecting her anytime soon. ("Your sister's supposed to be here 'around three,'" Violet had sniffed when she greeted them. "But you know how Rosamund is—sometimes it can get so far 'around' with her that it turns into three the next day.")

Robert, meanwhile, had made plans to meet some friends from his teen years down at the village pub, and Cora had insisted he go without her, sensing that this was very much meant to be guy time. He'd told her that his aunt Roberta was coming for tea with his mother, but he'd offered to tell Violet that she wanted to rest after their journey, if she preferred. She did prefer—she was achy after four hours in the car on the way here, and the choice between stretching her back out against the cool sheets or sitting through what was sure to be a formal tea with a mother-in-law who would look down her nose at her was laughably easy.

Cora had not been lying down for long, though—her nose in a mystery novel—when she heard the sound of Violet's voice, accompanied by that of another woman's, drifting into her room. They were taking tea not in the library or the drawing room, she realized quickly, but in the morning room, directly below Mercia—a sensible choice, she supposed, as its smaller size made it a better fit for a party of two.

Interested in Robert's family, and still trying to keep straight who was who, she had found herself eavesdropping on the conversation as it floated up the back stairs. Roberta evidently had a daughter called Susan—Robert's cousin, Cora surmised—who she did not feel was overly marriageable. The girl could not have been older than Cora, given that she seemed to have recently finished college, and thus Cora thought it very early for such concerns. What was more, Roberta's worries seemed to be based on her conclusions that Susan was neither pretty nor pleasant, leaving Cora thanking God that, while she and her own mother had their differences, Martha would _never_ have said anything less than complimentary about her to anyone else.

Eventually—just when Cora was considering returning to her novel, thinking she did not care to hear Susan abused in absentia any further—the conversation turned, naturally, to the recent marriage in Violet's family: hers and Robert's.

"You hid it well at that reception," Roberta began, "but I can't imagine you're happy at all."

"Happy?" Violet snorted. "The whole thing is ridiculous, and I could throttle Robert."

Cora winced—not that she didn't already know her mother-in-law's feelings.

"Is it his fault, though, that the girl got herself pregnant?" This was such a stupid sentiment that Cora couldn't hold back a slight smile, picturing herself attempting to inject a vial of sperm into her own body in her apartment bathroom, entirely removed from Robert.

"He's a grown man, Roberta. He should have had the self-control to keep his pants on, no matter how much she seduced him." Violet sighed. "And now he's stuck on being _honorable_."

"Is that all? You don't think he's fallen for her?"

"Oh, he likes her well enough; don't get me wrong," Violet said. "But he wouldn't have married her if it hadn't been for the pregnancy."

Yes, he would've. She knew Violet was lying to Roberta, for she could not imagine Robert saying such a thing to his mother.

Roberta took her turn to sigh. "That's very unfortunate, Violet. I hate to think your boy's had his life ruined by some Jewish-American princess."

Cora felt hot tears fill her eyes at the words, and she bit her lip angrily, forcing herself to hold them back. She was _sick_ of tears and emotions and the roller coaster of early pregnancy. Determined to listen to no more of this rot, she got up and quietly closed the door, blocking out the older women's voices.

 _It doesn't matter what his mother and some horrid aunt think,_ she'd told herself as she settled back onto the bed and picked up her novel. _You and Robert are happily married, and you love each other, and he did_ not _marry you because of the baby._

Yet for the last half hour, these thoughts had been drowned out by Violet and Roberta's words, and she hadn't turned a single page. She wished Robert were back—she would feel better instantly, she thought, if she were snuggled against the warmth of his chest.

Suddenly, she heard the _ding_ of an incoming text message, and she got up again to retrieve her phone from where it was resting on the dressing table.

The screen identified the sender as John Bates—who on earth was that? She couldn't place the name and, puzzled, she opened the text. "Just got here…you guys around somewhere?" read the latest text in a long thread. Just above it, another text from John read, "Running late…half an hour or so…"

This was Robert's phone, Cora realized, vaguely recalling that he had a friend named John who must have been among today's group. When she'd gotten to England last month, she'd bought a new, British phone and added herself to Robert's plan…coincidentally, with a mobile that looked just like his. It did not surprise her that he had apparently walked off with hers and left his behind in its place.

Her finger was moving to press the screen off, assuming John would either find the group on his own or text another of the men, when the text at the top of the screen caught her eye. Earlier in the thread, Robert himself had typed the words, "We got married in March b/c she was pregnant."


	17. Chapter 17

_We got married in March because she was pregnant. Because she was pregnant. Because she was pregnant._ The words repeated over and over again in Cora's head, matching the rhythm of her steps as she walked.

In the aftermath of finding the old text, she'd begun to feel that she couldn't bear one more minute in the Mercia bedroom, one more minute in Downton, where every inch of carpet and plaster made her think of her husband and her marriage. She needed to be outside, she needed to be on the nearest thing she could get to neutral ground, and thus she'd grabbed her coat—for, whatever London was doing with the end of April, Yorkshire had remained stubbornly cold and gray—and gone for an aimless walk that had eventually led her into the village. The streets were more crowded than they'd been in March, with residents scurrying in and out of shops as they prepared for the next day's holiday, but she found she liked that—none of these people seemed to recognize her as the new countess in jeans and a black wool coat, and it was comforting to blend into a crowd, her mind concentrating on not bumping into anyone instead of on the sentence she'd read on Robert's phone.

It had been merely cloudy when Cora had left the abbey, but a few light raindrops had begun to fall as she'd approached the village. She'd paid that very little attention, as her honeymoon in the area had taught her that a few raindrops were an obligatory part of most afternoons, but they were slowly becoming more steady as she wandered the streets. She hadn't bothered with an umbrella, and this coat didn't even have a hood, so perhaps she should make her way back to the house? The air still had a wintery bite to it, and she had no desire to be soaking wet in this temperature.

As though the weather had heard her thoughts and wanted to weigh in, the steady drizzle turned, in the blink of an eye, to sheets of rain. The long walk back to Downton, she thought as she hurried under a shop's awning, would have her as wet as if she'd gone swimming. Perhaps she should duck inside here, and wait for a break in the rain?

 _Robert's grandmother's house was a mere three streets over._ They had driven past it last month, and she was reasonably confident she could find it again. What if she went there to wait this out? She knew a couple blocks was more than it sounded like in this weather, but the suggestion of seeing someone who seemed to have a genuine fondness for her was unavoidably appealing. Drawing her coat closer around her, Cora darted back out into the rain.

* * *

"Cora! Whatever are you doing out in this without so much as brolly?"

"It wasn't raining when I left," Cora said as the elder Lady Grantham pulled her inside, immediately divesting her of her coat before Cora could begin to undo the buttons herself. "But then it started, and I thought…I thought I might come here until it passed," she said feebly, suddenly realizing how rude it was to imply that her only interest in seeing her grandmother-in-law had been to get out of the rain. "That is, if you aren't in the middle of anything—"

But Mary, who had been a flurry of activity since Cora had stepped inside, brushed this off. "Heavens, no! You're always welcome, Cora—and I hate to think what my grandson would say if I left his bride standing out in the rain!" She handed Cora a towel from the hall closet she had been rifling through. "For your hair, love—or would you rather blow it dry upstairs?"

Cora shook her head, rubbing the towel over it. "No, I usually don't bother."

"Then come and sit by the fire," Mary said, taking the towel back and now drawing a blanket from the closet. "You're quite damp, and we can't have you catching cold, not in your condition." She led Cora into a blue room off the front hall with a large bay window, where she seated her in an armchair next to a roaring fire that made Cora feel as though she'd fallen back in time a hundred years.

"I'll go and put the kettle on," Mary said, tucking the blanket over Cora's lap. "We'll have a spot of tea and some biscuits."

She was back a few minutes later, a silver tray in her hands with a delicate, rose-covered teapot and two teacups, a small plate of cookies, a pitcher of milk, and a bowl of sugar cubes. She set it on a small table between Cora's chair and the couch and began to fill the cups. "How do you take your tea, love?"

"A small bit of milk, and two sugars," Cora said. She had not taken her tea any way at all before moving to England last month, but she had quickly learned that a dash of milk and two white cubes made it feel like drinking a candy bar, and she had become quite addicted.

"As do I," Mary said with a smile, stirring Cora's mixture together and passing her the cup before moving on to her own.

"You must tell me how you like London," she said when she had finished and settled herself on the couch. "Have you enjoyed living there?"

"Oh, absolutely!" As homesick as she had occasionally been, Cora could not fault the city. "I still feel like I'm on vacation."

"Rosamund says you've been using your time before the baby comes to sightsee. What have you liked best?"

"I suspect I'm supposed to say the National Gallery or the Tate or the V&A," Cora said, "but you can see a great art museum anywhere in Europe, can't you?"

Mary nodded. "You can."

"So I think what I've loved best—what seemed so very English to me—was the British Library. They had a handwritten draft of _Persuasion_ , and Austen's writing desk was even on display."

She fell into easy conversation with her grandmother-in-law, talking over books and London sights and Yorkshire, but the text she had seen lurked in the back of her mind, a shadow she sensed perpetually in the corner of her eye.

"Gran," she said slowly in a moment's silence, "do you think…" Cora trailed off, not sure what she wanted to ask or how she could raise the subject at all in front of Robert's grandmother.

"Do I think what, love?"

"Isn't my marriage…do you think it's…rather odd?"

Mary's brow furrowed. "Odd? Because you're American, and Robert's English? I don't think that's odd, not in today's world. And as I told you, you're not the first American to be Countess of Grantham."

Cora had nearly forgotten the first American countess, and she smiled slightly at her mention. "No, I don't mean that—but you must tell me about her later. I meant…because I'm pregnant."

Mary smiled gently. "You must be quite the innocent, Cora, if you think you're the only woman on earth ever to conceive before her wedding night."

"I guess I don't mean that it's unusual," Cora said, blushing. "It's just…do you think…did Robert marry me because of the baby?"

"Goodness, I haven't the foggiest," Mary said, and Cora's heart sank, for she'd secretly been hoping the old lady would reveal that Robert had confided an intention to marry his girlfriend long before the pregnancy. "I would be very _surprised_ if that were the case," she went on, "given that he seems to think you've set the universe in motion. But it's not what I think that matters—do _you_ think that's why he married you?"

Cora looked away, twisting her rings slowly on her finger. She did not want to lie, but she also did not want it repeated to Robert that she believed his motives in marriage had been far more pragmatic than romantic. He would again assure her otherwise, and she didn't much want to listen to it when she knew it was a lie.

"He says not," she said eventually.

"But you do not believe him."

Cora shrugged.

"Has he not been treating you well at home?" Mary asked, her brow furrowed. "Has he not been kind, lately?"

"Oh no! No, not at all. He's wonderfully kind, wonderfully."

Mary nodded. "So he's appeared to me." She paused. "I will not give you false reassurances by pretending that I have any special knowledge of Robert's motives; I don't. But what I will tell you is that it is obvious to me that you and Robert are very, very fond of each other…that you care for one another…that he seems to love you, and you him." Cora nodded emphatically at these last words. "Believe me when I say that all that is far, far more than could be said about most of the couples that have lived at Downton in the past. Would it really be so terrible if he _had_ married you for the baby's sake? Think what that would mean—he doesn't want you to be alone with the baby because he cares for you, and he cares for the child, too. It means he wants a family with you; it means he's made a great commitment to the mother of his child. Would any of that be such a bad thing?"

It wasn't, not when it was phrased that way. But Cora wanted more than to know that Robert cared for her. She wanted him to be madly, passionately in love, so head over heels for her that he could not have done otherwise but marry her. She did not want to feel that he was so uncertain of his interest in taking her as his wife that she had needed a pregnancy to tip the balance in her favor.

But she did have a husband who cared for her; a father for her child; a happy, companionable marriage; a beautiful estate and a London flat and enough money that she did not have to work. It was much more than many people had, and she tried to swallow her romantic dreams of a lovesick Robert.

"No," she said at last, "I don't suppose any of that's a bad thing."

"I don't doubt that he loves you, my dear," Mary said gently. "And given that's the case, I would be very surprised to learn that he had married you just because of the baby."

 _But he had,_ Cora thought. The words she'd read a couple hours earlier couldn't have been clearer that Robert had married her expressly because of the baby.

"You know, the last American Countess of Grantham was _not_ loved by her husband, not when she first came here," Mary went on. Cora sensed in her tone that the old woman was seeking to distract her from her sudden melancholy, but she was grateful. There was nothing for her to do now but to be distracted and try to forget Robert's text.

"Tell me about her," she said, settling back in the armchair. "I think you said her name was Helen?"

Mary nodded. "Yes, Helen. She came from New York, and her father had made millions in steel."

Cora let herself be soothed by a tale of elegant Edwardian England, a world of sweeping gowns and top hats and thriving estates and horse-drawn carriages, as she drank her way through a second cup of tea. Robert's great-great-grandmother's parents had been determined to buy her a title on the other side of the Atlantic and had hoped to make her a duchess, or at least a marchioness. This ambition had been defeated, however, the night Helen Waterman had met Edward Crawley, Viscount Downton, in a Mayfair ballroom. She had fallen irrevocably in love with him after three dances, and while Robert's grandfather did not love the American beauty whose eye he had caught, his own parents had been pressing him to marry an heiress before Downton would have to be sold. As soon as Edward learned how vast the Waterman fortune was—and how far beyond the Crawleys' original hopes it was—he wasted no time in proposing, and Helen's parents had to make do with the fact that their daughter would only ever be a countess.

The couple had married in New York and then honeymooned here in Yorkshire, and Helen began to realize that her new husband was not in love with her; he was in love with her money. There was nothing to be done for it: she had signed away her inheritance to the estate, and she could hardly go home in disgrace. And so she stayed at Downton, grieving for what she now knew she'd never had in the first place.

But then there was a change, a change in Edward. Helen had always claimed it had dated to around their first anniversary, but Edward protested that it hadn't been nearly so long as that. He had slowly noticed whom, exactly, he had married—not just an American heiress with the cash to save his estate, but a great beauty who was warmth and gentleness and kindness itself, and he had not been able to do anything but fall in love with the woman who so clearly loved him.

"She blossomed after that, they always said," Mary went on. "They had my husband's father, and then his aunts and uncles, and she made for a _wonderful_ countess…her own mother-in-law's doubts aside," she added wryly. "I'm told Edward's mother thought it would be a _disaster_ to have an American running Downton! She knew it had to be done—they weren't ever going to find an English girl with that kind of money—but she _hated_ the idea. Hated Helen too, I think, and she warmed only slightly over the years. I think what annoyed her the most was what a smashing success her American daughter-in-law eventually made of her role—she was wildly popular among the aristocracy, and she was so very loved by the village…and loved for the very warmth and openness that so annoyed Edward's mother."

"Did you know her yourself?" Cora asked, suspecting that the slight wistfulness in the old lady's voice meant she had.

"Oh, very well! She lived in the dower house for the first thirty years of my own marriage—she lived to be nearly a hundred. Almost into Robert's lifetime—she died just before Rosamund was born. And I'm quite glad I had her around for so long…I think she would have been a hard act to follow, otherwise. I don't think the House of Grantham has ever had such a popular countess."

"Wasn't she…for your own mother-in-law to follow, not you?" Cora asked, trying to work out the family tree.

Mary shook her head. "My mother-in-law was never the countess. My husband's father didn't outlive his own father, unfortunately."

"So the earldom passed from Edward to…"

"George. My husband, Robert's grandfather, was George Crawley, the eighth earl, followed, of course, by Robert's father, Patrick. I do wish you'd known Patrick."

It hit Cora suddenly that this woman had been the mother of Robert's father, the mother of the man who had died so suddenly three months earlier. She'd known Mary was Robert's paternal grandmother, and the implications of that should have been clear enough, but somehow, she had never quite given the matter any thought.

"I'm so terribly sorry," she said, feeling the emptiness of her own words. "I–I can't imagine losing a child." Her own stomach clenched at the thought, and she laid her hand against her slight bump, reassuring herself at its presence.

"Thank you," Mary said softly. "I hope you never have to imagine it, love."

"Robert's father sounds like a wonderful man. I hadn't thought about him being your son, but of course he was. I would have offered my condolences earlier…"

A wry smile flitted across Mary's lips. "You'd be surprised how many people don't seem to have thought about him being my son. He seems to have been exclusively _Violet's husband_ , at least in his death," she said, a bitterness in her tone that surprised Cora. "I'm sorry," she went on immediately. I shouldn't be unkind; she's grieving as well."

In the silence that followed, Cora slowly gave in to the temptation to ask for more information about her mother-in-law from the other woman who was clearly not high on Violet's list. "Violet seems to…dislike me very much," she said tentatively.

Mary blinked. "Of course she dislikes you, my dear."

"Why?" Cora asked, taken aback at the quick admission, when Robert had so often insisted that it was not personal. "Is it just because I'm not a titled Englishwoman? It seems so very late in history to despise someone just for that."

"It is, and I doubt you'd find it in most great families. You might have a skeptical mother-in-law, but I doubt you'd have the reception you've found here. But it's not so much that Violet has an innate class bias—that is, she _does_ , but it's worse than that. It goes back to Helen, you see. She was alive and well in the early years of Violet and Patrick's marriage, and even after her death, Violet spent much of her time as viscountess and countess living in her shadow. Downton _loved_ Violet. The rest of the Yorkshire aristocracy loved her, too. And they didn't love her in spite of being a common American; they loved her because of it. They loved her because she was everything Violet isn't.

"This is an odd world for Violet, I think. She was born in the wrong era—she'd have been a smashing success in the Victorian age, or under a Tudor monarch. But she never quite got the trick of the twentieth century, much less the twenty-first. She's not prepared to meet people on their own level, she's not prepared to do charity work, she's not prepared to do her own _shopping_ , and she resents that she was born in an era that forces her to—an era that idolizes one of her predecessors, who was a much better fit for the modern world than her.

"If we didn't dislike each other so much, I'd almost feel sorry for her. I think she saw herself as the first respectable countess in generations…and then she discovered no one much cared about her background."

"Didn't she think you were respectable?" Cora asked. "You were a titled Englishwoman."

Unexpectedly, Mary laughed. "Oh, you are a dear!" she said. "You're too lost with English accents to know what they mean, aren't you? I wasn't titled; I wasn't titled at all."

"You…weren't?" She'd never heard any backstory about Robert's grandparents, but it had never occurred to her that a mid-century match hadn't been a very traditional one.

"Heavens, no! And anyone here who hears me speak knows instantly that I didn't grow up in a house like Downton. My father was a baker, and my mother took in sewing. Good people, but working class people. I won a scholarship to Lady Margaret Hall at Oxford, and I met the Viscount Downton there."

"Which is why…you and Violet don't…"

Mary smiled. "Yes. And think of it all from her perspective: she's embarrassed to marry into a family where she's following a new money American, and then a working class Yorkshire girl, as countess, but she thinks she can salvage things and raise standards…and _then_ her only son, the new earl, shows up with some art student from Ohio."

Had it been put thus by anyone else, in any other tone, she would have been stung, but the warmth in her grandmother-in-law's voice and the twinkle in her eyes let her giggle instead, and soon she was laughing, Robert and his phone forgotten.

Cora had lost track of how long she'd sat there, listening to Mary's own history and then discussing the new baby, when at last there was another knock at the door, and Mary went to answer it.

"Robert!" Cora heard her call out a moment later, and her heart sank—not with disappointment at his arrival, but with grief at the reminder.

"I was hoping Cora might be here," she heard him say. "She's not home, and I had the car, so I know she must be walking, and the rain—" There was worry in his voice, and she tried to let it soothe her. _He does care for you,_ she tried to tell herself. And she knew that he did…but she wanted more than that from the man she had given her heart to.

She heard Mary assure him that Cora had been here all afternoon, and then they both joined her in the sitting room.

"Cora!" A relieved smile spread across Robert's face. "I wondered where you'd gotten off to in this weather."

"I went for a walk," she told him as she stood up from her chair, hoping he would not want to prolong the visit. Sitting through a conversation between her husband and his grandmother, after she'd very nearly claimed she wasn't sure he loved her, sounded hellishly awkward, and they would all be seeing each other tomorrow anyway at the family luncheon. "And then I decided to stop here for awhile."

"And I'm very glad she did," Mary said approvingly. "We've had a lovely visit. Would you like a cup of tea yourself, Robert?"

"Oh no, we ought to be getting back…Rosamund and Duke have just arrived." Cora suppressed an urge to sigh with relief, and once they had said their goodbyes, she followed him out the door and to his waiting car—covered from the persistent rain this time by Robert's umbrella.

"I'm glad you went to see Gran this afternoon," he said as they settled into the front seat. "She seemed very taken with you at the reception last month."

The words _we got married in March because she was pregnant_ were pounding too loudly in Cora's head for her to think of a coherent response, so she merely nodded.

"Did you tell her about hearing the heartbeat?"

She nodded again. "Yes, I did." Indeed, the heartbeat had been one of the first things she had mentioned to her grandmother-in-law as the conversation had turned toward the baby, but it troubled her that it was also the first thing Robert asked about.

For there was a suspicion playing in the back of her mind that was beginning to make a great deal of sense. She knew, of course, that Robert had married her because she was pregnant. But it had not, she suspected, been out of honor, or out of concern for her future as a single mother, or because he was so fond of her that he was already hoping to marry her at some point.

Rather, he had married his pregnant girlfriend because, as Mary had put it, he cared for the child. While Cora did not imagine he was anywhere near as obsessed with getting an heir as his ancestors might have been, of course Robert would know that he would need to have a son. Why not marry the girl who had already proved her fertility, the girl who had a fifty-fifty shot at producing an heir before their first anniversary? The need for a little Viscount Downton aside, it could not have been clearer that Robert was thrilled at the idea of becoming a father. Indeed, she loved nothing more than how much he seemed to love their unborn baby. It was not hard to see how his excitement at the thought of a child had led him to marry a girl he otherwise had no long-term interest in.

But there was hope in this, she realized slowly as they drove back to Downton. If Robert so loved this baby, if he so desperately wanted to have children, mightn't he come to love the mother as well? Of course he would. She could not imagine he could spend months watching her carry the baby he loved, and then see her give birth to it, and _not_ fall in love with her.

It may not have been how she would have wished it to happen, but she would still be loved, she thought as she caressed her belly. By the time this baby was here, Robert would be in love with her, and the way that had come about wouldn't matter.


	18. Chapter 18

Cora watched the fields of sheep slowly slide past her window, the little lambs born over the last few weeks tucked in next to their mothers as the day drew to a close. It was early Sunday evening a week after Easter, and she and Robert were on a train back to London from a weekend spent in Bath. She'd seen street after street of Georgian architecture, toured the ancient Roman baths, taken tea in the eighteenth-century Pump Room, and imagined she was inside a Jane Austen novel. Robert, who had clearly intended this to be a romantic getaway, had booked them into a gorgeous old hotel in the Royal Crescent, where they'd had their own terrace overlooking the garden.

The short trip had been less awkward than she might have imagined. She was trying to make her peace with what she'd read on Robert's phone and endeavoring to act as though nothing had changed between them…and, of course, on his end, nothing had. He was as sweet as he had ever been to her—indeed, had she not seen the text, she would have taken much of this weekend as an affirmation of how much he loved her. The sightseeing had been planned around her interests, and he'd fussed over whether she was too tired or whether she was walking too much. He'd listened to her go on and on about _Persuasion_ and _Northanger Abbey_ , and at the Assembly Rooms, where Austen's Catherine Moreland had met her love, he'd twirled her around the empty dance floor as she'd laughed. When they'd gotten back to their room last night, she hadn't had to utter a word of complaint at her exhaustion before he'd seated her on the bed, slipped her ballet flats off, and taken her feet into his lap, gently rubbing away the soreness she'd acquired on the cobblestones. They'd made love later, as Cora tried to turn off her mind and think of nothing more than how lovely the day had been.

Mostly, this strategy of willful ignorance had worked throughout their time in Bath. Robert, after all, had been fond enough of her to date her in New York, and she tried to pretend they were _still_ dating, with no baby and no off-kilter marriage, enjoying a romantic weekend together. It was not that Robert did not care for her; it was just that he would have preferred not to _marry_ her, not to commit himself for life to a woman he'd never intended to have a long-term relationship with.

Cora could find no grounds to be angry with him for this: the pregnancy was both their faults, and surely marrying her was the best thing he could have done, under the circumstances. He couldn't help that he hadn't desired it independently, and, while she might think he should have been honest in his proposal, she understood very well why he'd feared to hurt her.

 _The way he'd hurt her now._ For the closer they got to London, the clearer it was that she was not enjoying a weekend away with her boyfriend but heading home with a husband who had married her for reasons other than being head over heels in love. Without meaning to, Cora sighed softly.

"Are you tired, darling?" Robert asked immediately.

She nodded—partly because it was true, and partly because she hoped it would excuse the melancholy that was slowly slipping over her. "Yes, but I'm glad we went. It's such a beautiful city."

"I thought you'd like it. I owe you a trip to their spa this autumn," he went on. She knew that Bath had built a large modern spa several years earlier, drawing from the same hot springs the ancients had used. "I called and asked before we went if you could have anything done there safely, and they said not in your first trimester, but they have several treatments for pregnant women who are further along. We'll go back in September or October, and you can spend the day being pampered."

Of course he had called the spa in an attempt to arrange something for her. Of course he was already thinking ahead to how he might ease her when she was worn from the weight of an eight-month belly. She wondered unpleasantly if this—like much of his sweetness this weekend—wasn't more a symptom of his guilt than his affection.

"You haven't got to do that," she said softly.

He kissed her cheek. "No, but I like taking care of you. You're carrying our child."

It was a phrase that made her want to cry.

 _Ask him,_ a small voice inside her head insisted. _Ask him now._ She'd been toying all week with whether or not to mention the text to Robert and ask him what he'd meant by it. Its meaning, of course, was perfectly clear, but she was curious how he'd respond, and she had gone back and forth with whether or not it would be easier to have the truth in the open.

"Robert," she began hesitantly, "I was wondering…"

"Yes, love?"

 _Love._ She swallowed. "That is, last weekend, I…when you went off to the pub, I…" She paused, searching for words and feeling her courage abandoning her. "I…" She couldn't say it. She simply couldn't, and she cast about for something else to ask. "Your grandmother told me about the last American countess, and that she lived to be very old, and I wondered if you'd met her? Do you or Rosamund remember her?"

She was blushing at the clumsiness of a question she already knew the answer to, but Robert didn't seem to notice. "No, unfortunately she died a few years before Ros was born. But I did grow up hearing about her. From Gran, of course." He grinned. "I gather you learned that my mum doesn't much like to talk about her."

Cora forced a laugh. "Yes, we did talk about your mom." She closed her eyes, both regretful and relieved that she had not mentioned the text.

"Do you want to sleep for a bit?" Robert asked her, taking her closed eyes as fatigue.

"Yes, I think I might," she said, turning away to rest her head on the window before he could suggest she curl up against his shoulder.

* * *

 _Just checking in…how are you doing now?_

Cora's finger hovered over her phone screen as she considered how to respond to Rosamund's text. She did not enjoy knowing she had caused people to worry needlessly, but she also did not want to be entirely dishonest, and the truth was that she was feeling quite miserable.

It was Tuesday afternoon, two days after she and Robert had returned from Bath, and she'd been planning to meet her sister-in-law near Ros's office for lunch. But she'd woken up with a dull ache in her lower back that had hung on stubbornly throughout the morning in spite of her attempts to stretch it away, and the idea of trekking halfway across the city for a lunch date had seemed less and less appealing. She'd texted Rosamund, who'd insisted they cancel and that Cora stay home and rest.

It hadn't hurt so very badly then, and she'd chastised herself at the time for making an issue of it, telling herself that most women worked throughout their pregnancies, rather than lounging at home the way she was doing. But the pain had grown worse as the afternoon had worn on, and her back was now throbbing steadily. She had curled up on the couch with a hot water bottle she'd found in the closet and was trying to distract herself with Netflix, but she hadn't succeeded.

 _A bit worse,_ she texted back. _But I'm okay._ That was true enough—she may not have felt okay, but Cora had no doubt that she _was_ okay. She'd had occasional backaches over the last couple months, and the books on pregnancy and babies she'd been poring over had assured her that this wasn't unusual, even if she barely had any belly yet. Hormones designed to prepare her body for birth were loosening her joints and her tissues, which left her spine unstable. It had never hurt this badly before, but she blamed that on all the walking she'd done in Bath catching up with her.

Rosamund texted back a sad face, accompanied by, _Are you resting?_ She replied that yes, she was lying down. _Tell Robert I expect him to bring home dinner tonight,_ Ros's next text read, and Cora smiled. She didn't doubt he would.

As disconcerted as she sometimes was now at the attention he paid to her pregnancy, she had no interest tonight in worrying about his motivations. She merely wanted comfort, she wanted his presence, she wanted someone who would fetch for her and sit with her and try to rub the pain away. She'd been watching the clock all afternoon, waiting for the hours to tick by and his workday to end.

* * *

"Cora?" He knew his voice sounded sharp with his worry, but he couldn't help it. Cora had said there was nothing seriously wrong when she'd texted an hour ago, asking him to pick up take-out on his way home, and he believed her, but the thought of her in pain for any reason made his heart race.

"I'm here," he heard her soft accent say quietly. He stepped into the front room off the main entryway, where he found her huddled on the couch, her face drawn.

Setting the Chinese he'd brought on a side table, he went to her, crouching at her side and stroking her curls back off her face. "Are you sure nothing's wrong?" he asked. His anxiety made his voice gruff, but he hoped she'd see the concern in his eyes instead.

"Yes, the baby's fine," she said, forcing a smile. "I think I just overdid it last weekend."

But he could see she was hurting, and he _hated_ it. He was beginning to suspect he'd be simply crazy by the end of her labor.

"Do you want to eat dinner in here, sweetheart?" he asked. "So you can keep lying down?"

Cora shook her head. "No, that's not necessary. I'll be all right." And before he could stop her, she sat up stiffly. His chest ached at the grimace on her face as she stood, and he took a pillow from the couch before following her to the kitchen.

"Here," he said as he arranged the cushion in one of the kitchen chairs, thinking she'd find it more comfortable than resting against the wooden slats. "Would it be better for your back to sit against this?"

She nodded. "Yes, I think so," she said softly, easing herself down into it. "Thank you."

He bent and kissed her forehead, and she looked up at him, her blue eyes full of something he couldn't quite identify.

Cora was quiet during dinner, which did not surprise him, given how poorly he could tell she felt, and he tried to keep his anxious questions to a minimum. This was normal enough, she assured him, and yes, she'd had pain before, though not this bad, and it was easily explained by their weekend, she claimed. Robert wanted to throttle himself for suggesting the Bath trip.

"Why don't you go lie down again?" he suggested when they were finished. "I'll clean this up."

She nodded, getting to her feet. "I think I'll just go to bed."

He stood as well, giving her a gentle hug and laying a light kiss on the top of her head. "Would you like me to sit with you and rub your back? Do you think that would help?

She shrugged. "It might."

When he joined her in the bedroom a few minutes later, he found her curled on her left side with the blanket pulled up to her chin. She looked very small alone in the expanse of their bed, and her closed eyes made him wonder if she hadn't drifted off already. "Cora?" he whispered.

"Yes?" she said softly, her eyes opening.

"I just wondered if you were asleep."

She shook her head. "No, not yet."

He brought the chair from her vanity to the side of the bed and bent to kiss her forehead before sitting down. "Where are you hurting?" he asked as he slipped his arm under the sheets, not wanting to take the covers from her.

"My lower back," she said quietly. "Near my hips."

"Here?" he asked, rubbing slow circles against her nightgown.

"Mmm-hmm." She was silent for a few minutes and then murmured, "Your hand's warm."

"Are you cold, sweetheart?" he asked, wondering if he ought to get her another blanket.

"No. It just feels nice against my back."

"I'm glad it's helping, darling." He kissed her shoulder, but in truth, he wasn't glad, for he could not help but feel—as he had felt for days now—that there was something more she wanted from him, some way he was failing her, something about his wife that he did not quite understand.

* * *

Cora awoke alone the next morning and was instantly glad that Robert had apparently thought she should sleep in. By the time he'd arrived home last night, she'd felt generally unwell and had begun to suspect that the ache in her muscles was perhaps the start of the flu or some other bug. It was a thought that was confirmed as soon as her eyes opened, for she now had a sharp pain in her stomach in addition to the one in her back.

She moaned softly and moved to roll over, but she was suddenly aware as she shifted that there was a dampness between her legs…there was a dampness all over. She froze. Surely this wasn't…

Hesitantly, Cora propped herself up on her elbow and then drew the covers back.

A deep red stain had spread out beneath her.


	19. Chapter 19

AN: This chapter is much shorter than usual, but I really thought it should stand on its own. Please don't come after me with pitchforks for what happens here.

Happy Thanksgiving to the Americans in the audience!

* * *

"Cora?" Robert's first thought, when he stirred just past midnight, was that Cora was not in bed next to him, and the realization alarmed him.

 _Nothing is wrong,_ he told himself, but he could not quite believe it in light of how unwell she'd seemed over the last two days. It had been just last night that she'd been so troubled with her back, and when he'd come home from work today, she'd claimed she felt better, yet there had been a slow, guarded hesitance in her movements all evening that had suggested she was not being entirely truthful. He'd been even more bothered by how quiet, almost sad she'd seemed, and he'd worried after she went to bed early that perhaps she was coming down with something.

All of this propelled him out of bed in search of her.

When he stepped out into the hallway, he saw immediately that there was light peeking out along the bathroom doorframe. This was likely nothing more than a midnight trip to the loo, he thought, but he moved closer, intending to knock and ask if she was all right. But then he heard it: quiet, suppressed, desperate sobs.

"Cora!" Robert flung open the door to find her sitting on the floor, her knees hugged to her chest, weeping as she looked up at him in shock.

He was instantly on his knees and at her side. "Darling, what is it? What's wrong? Are you sick? Is there something wrong with the baby?"

She shook her head violently at that, beginning to cry harder. "Th–the baby's gone," she managed to whisper.

"What?" That didn't make sense. "What do you mean?"

Cora shook her head again. "It's g–gone. I…I…I…" But then she shook her head again and hid her face against her knees.

"Cora, tell me what's happened," he said, laying a firm hand on her shoulder and refusing to let himself interpret her words.

"I…I… _miscarried_ ," she murmured so quietly that he almost missed it.

"Oh God." He felt his intestines twist. How long had she been huddled here bleeding? They needed to get a doctor, there might still be time; she needed medical attention, even if the child _couldn't_ be saved…what was she doing hiding in their bathroom? His dismay at her behavior shifted quickly to heartbreak as he considered that she'd been too upset at discovering her blood to do anything but sit and weep.

"Sweetheart, we need to get you to the hospital," he said, trying to hold his voice steady and determined to be calm for her sake. He caressed her back. "You need to see a doctor, right away—"

"I already _have_!" she wailed.

"You…what?" That didn't make any sense either. She'd been home all evening…

Cora raised her head at last. "I w–went this morning…I…Rosamund…took me," she gasped between sobs. "I woke up, a–and…there was b–blood, and I…called her…and she took…me to St.–St. Mary's, and they…they…they…" She shook her head again and dissolved into harsher tears.

"Why didn't you _call_ me?" Robert gasped. Her admission had felt like a punch in the stomach: how could his wife have miscarried a baby and only called his _sister_? How could it have been hidden from him all evening? _Why_ had she hidden it, and when had she _meant_ to tell him?

The only response he got was another shake of her head.

He drew in a quick, sharp breath, reeling from what he'd just learned. It was as though he'd just stepped off a spinning ride at an amusement park that had been far too much for him and was desperately trying to regain his footing and not crash to the ground as he staggered toward the exit. He could not quite grieve for the baby, or even fully consider its loss: the fact that their child had died seemed a very _distant_ fact, and he had a vague sense that he was shoving it aside to weep for later. At the moment, all he could feel was shock at the news, and hurt at the way it had been handled, and—most of all—a searing pain for Cora, who was clearly shattered. Was that why she hadn't told him—she'd been too traumatized to repeat the information? _But then why call his sister?_ She clearly hadn't minded telling _Rosamund_.

It didn't matter right now, he told himself. What mattered now was Cora, whose careful movements earlier, the way she had seemed to curl protectively around her stomach, now made sense. She'd…well, not given birth, exactly. What happened when a woman had a miscarriage? Would there have been…some sort of operation? What would have happened to…? He was slightly nauseous at these thoughts, and all the more frightened at the realization that he knew so very little about any of this.

"You should be in bed," he said, his voice harsher than he'd intended. "Not sitting on a hard tile floor."

Cora said nothing, but she did not resist when he scooped her up in his arms, sliding one arm beneath her knees and wrapping the other behind her shoulders. She rested her head against his shoulder as he lifted her, carrying her back to their bedroom where he set her on the bed.

She immediately curled into a tight ball, a posture that made him want to lie down and weep himself, but he swallowed hard, forcing himself to focus on the task of settling Cora. He pressed her shoulder, tacitly conveying that he would return, and, blinking, walked back into the hallway to search through the first aid box in the linen closet for a hot water bottle.

"Here," he said, touching her arm a few minutes later, once he had found and filled it. "Will you let me put this against your belly?" He felt acutely the paltriness of his offering in contrast to their loss, but Cora uncurled slightly, giving him access to rest the soft wool pouch against her abdomen before she reflexively closed her body again. Robert brushed a kiss to her hair—a desperate kiss that begged for her to be comforted.

"Can I bring you anything else?" he asked, suddenly feeling his own tears threaten again. She shook her head—of course she shook her head. No, there was nothing he could bring her that would erase the last twenty-four hours.

His heart thudding heavily against his ribs, he climbed back into bed and wrapped his arms around her.


	20. Chapter 20

"Cora?"

"Mmm?" she murmured in response, knowing he had seen her eyes open and that there would be no pretending she was still asleep.

"How are you this morning?" he asked tentatively. _How was she?_ Cora closed her eyes, as though the answer might be written on her eyelids. She lacked words for how she was.

"How are you feeling?" Robert continued, and she felt an odd sense of relief at this clarification. How she was feeling, physically, was a much simpler question, and she slowly took stock of her body. There was a soreness between her legs, and a dull, empty ache in her stomach, but that was all. Nothing in her body matched the gaping wound in her heart.

"I'm a bit sore," she said softly, letting her eyes open a second time. "Nothing worse than that."

Robert, who had been seated in the chair at her dressing table, presumably waiting for her to wake, stood and came to sit on the edge of the bed at her waist. He gently brushed her curls back from her face, and she closed her eyes again before they could meet his. It hurt too much to look into his face.

He'd married her because of the baby. She'd been determined that he would love her because of the baby. And now there wasn't going to be a baby at all.

When she'd awakened yesterday morning, her first thought—after she had swallowed her initial horror—had been that she couldn't possibly call Robert. She was far too upset to consider telling him what was going on, and perhaps there would be something the doctors could do to save the child…and she'd never need to share this with him at all. Her intention had been to drive herself to the hospital, but the stabbing pain in her stomach at every movement had made it clear, before she'd even managed to get out of bed, that this would be impossible. And so she'd done the only thing she could think of: she'd called Rosamund, who had rushed from her office and raced to the Crawleys' flat.

"Stay calm," her sister-in-law had told her softly as she'd settled a whimpering Cora into a nest of pillows in the back seat of the car. "This may not mean what you think it does." She'd wanted to believe that, desperately, but the heavy flow of blood she could feel seeping from her body and the intensity of the cramps gripping her stomach were both arguing firmly against that notion.

And then, of course, they'd finally arrived at the hospital.

"Cora?" she heard Robert ask quietly, yanking her back to the present. "Will you tell me what happened yesterday?"

No. No, she would not tell him. He knew now that she'd lost the baby—oh God, he _knew_ —but there was no power on earth that would make her want to verbalize yesterday's events.

"Please," she whispered, her eyes still shut, "I don't want to relive it."

But of course, she was doing just that. Images of the interior of St. Mary's Hospital were floating through her mind, along with the antiseptic smell of the rooms, and the sound of the voices that had told her she was losing the baby, and the miscarriage was too far gone to be stopped, but that she had yet to pass it—"it," they had called what was left of the child, as though they were discussing a kidney stone. Doing so on her own would be a long, painful, difficult process, and so they'd suggested a short procedure—"procedure," as though this were the extraction of her wisdom teeth—to remove "the remains." She'd agreed and signed the forms, but she'd fought to stay awake as the anesthesia had slipped over her, suddenly feeling she must do something to _stop_ all of this. Of course, she'd sunk into unconsciousness anyway…and then at last she'd awakened, the agony in her stomach replaced by a dull, hollow, ache, an empty hole where the baby had been resting.

She'd cried then, and a new tear slipped from behind her closed eyelid at the memory.

" _Oh_ , my darling," she heard Robert say, and she felt his thumb brush her tear away, the touch of his skin burning hers. She couldn't…she couldn't be so _near_ to him, and with no other escape, she rolled away onto her stomach, her face against the pillow and her back to Robert. Her tears refused to stop, now that they had begun, but at least they were buried into her pillow rather than so very exposed to him.

His hand settled onto her back, rubbing gently, and she felt her spine stiffen in response. She couldn't think of Robert now, Robert and his pity, Robert and his disappointment, Robert and the desire he was likely fighting to put her on the first flight back to New York. Not now while her mind was full of the memories of yesterday.

"Please," she croaked. "I…want to be alone."

His hand stopped moving. "Cora…"

"Please, _go_!" she snapped with more force than she'd intended.

And then his hand was gone, the mattress was shifting as his weight was removed, and she was alone.

* * *

"Why aren't you at work?"

Robert glanced sharply up from the television screen, surprised to hear Cora's voice. He'd left her a couple hours earlier, alone in their room as she'd demanded, and he'd presumed she'd gone back to sleep. But here she was, standing a few feet from the couch, still in her pajamas, her eyes red but dry.

"Why aren't I at work?" he asked incredulously.

"It's half past ten," she said, as though this were any other morning. "I thought you would have gone in by now."

He had been irked last night when he'd discovered Cora had gone all day and all evening without so much as mentioning the miscarriage, but his worry and his concern had smothered it. And he had been hurt this morning when she'd pushed him away, but he'd told himself she was upset and grief-stricken and scarred by the events of yesterday, and he'd tried to make allowances. But this—this attitude that the loss of their child ought not to affect him, that he had no part in this, that he was expected to just go on with his day—this made him _angry_.

"My _wife_ had a miscarriage yesterday," he said, not caring how sharp his voice sounded. "I wanted to stay home with her."

"You haven't got to do that," she said quietly as she gingerly took a seat in the chair opposite him, her knees tucked to her chest.

"Dammit, Cora!"

She flinched at his raised voice, but he was too angry to feel any guilt at her wide-eyed stare.

"Why didn't you _tell_ me?" he went on. "Why didn't you call _me_ yesterday morning—or, for God's sake, even mention it when I got home?"

She didn't respond.

"Answer me!"

Cora's lip began to tremble, and it made him want to hold her…which only made him angrier. "I–I just _couldn't_ ," she began, wiping furiously at her eyes. "I just…it–it was…I couldn't do it _then_."

"Were you _ever_ going to tell me? Or did you just expect me to notice at some point that you didn't seem to be pregnant any longer?"

She hiccupped, choking back a sob at the word _pregnant_. "I _meant_ to," she squeaked as her tears began to pour over. "I…I…" But anything further was lost in sobs as she dashed back to their bedroom, where she slammed the door behind her.


	21. Chapter 21

It was mid-morning on Friday when Cora heard the apartment's doorbell ring, a couple hours after Robert had left for work. He had, of course, gone to work this morning, much as she'd suspected he would after the awkwardness of yesterday. They hadn't spoken since he'd demanded to know why she'd kept the miscarriage from him for fifteen hours, and he'd spent the night in the spare room. Yet the situation was almost a relief, for she doubted it was as painful as it would have been to interact with Robert, the disappointment in his eyes plainly visible. However, she knew that at some point, they would have to discuss the future of their marriage…their _pointless_ marriage.

She could not think, as she stood to answer the door, who it might be. A delivery of some sort? But she didn't think they'd ordered anything.

No unexpected delivery could have been more surprising than what she saw when she glanced through the peephole: Robert's grandmother.

"Gran!" she exclaimed as she flung open the door. "What on earth are you doing here? I didn't know you were in London—"

Mary smiled. "I took the train up this morning, love, and then got a cab here from King's Cross. I thought I'd come see you, if you don't mind a visitor."

"No, I don't mind," Cora said, stepping back to let her grandmother-in-law in. "Please come in." The very last thing she wanted was more time alone with her thoughts. "Did…did Robert tell you?" She had texted her mother yesterday, as well as Felice, but she had ignored the calls she had received from both of them in response. Robert, she assumed, had told his own family.

"He did, yes. And he seemed to be under the impression that you preferred to be alone. But from the way he talked, I thought that might not be quite accurate."

"No, it's not." It was precisely what she'd told Robert yesterday morning, but it couldn't have been further from the truth. She had been immensely grateful on Wednesday when Rosamund had insisted on sitting on the couch all afternoon while Cora napped, and the emptiness of the apartment in the last two hours had swirled loudly around her. "I don't want to be alone." _I just don't want to be with Robert,_ she added silently. "Can I get you anything? A cup of tea?"

"No," Mary said sternly, taking in Cora's pajamas and the hot water bottle that had been discarded on the couch when she'd stood to answer the door. "You're not well, and you won't be getting anyone anything. Go and get comfortable again, and I'll make us both a cup of tea."

Cora curled up on the couch, and a few minutes later, Mary returned with two steaming cups and took a seat next to Cora. "So tell me, love," she said softly, "how are you?"

"I…don't quite believe it," Cora replied. "I _can't_ believe it." And that was the truth of it: she had been continually stunned in the last two days to think that the baby was truly gone, that the doctors had been able to do nothing, that she wouldn't wake up and find this all a dream.

"Of course not…of course you can't. I'm sure it was a terrible shock."

"I keep _thinking_ about him or her…not just as a baby, but as a little boy, as a teenage girl." She paused, thinking of all the times, before and after the miscarriage, that she'd pictured a child with her dark hair and Robert's eyes. "We were going to name it Patrick if it was a boy, Summer if it was a girl."

Mary smiled gently. "Those are lovely names."

"The odd part was that it had never occurred to me that I _could_ have a miscarriage. I _know_ it's not uncommon before 12 weeks—and I wasn't quite there—but…there had just never been any question in my mind that there would be a baby next fall. I think—a lot of women—they…worry about it, and realize they might not make it out of their first trimester. That is, women who are…more mature than me." _Women who understand how these things work,_ she added silently as she stared into her teacup. _Women who are actually old enough to be mothers._

"Never be ashamed of optimism, Cora," Mary said, as though she had heard her thoughts. "It's what gets us through life."

She wasn't sure she had anything left to be optimistic about. "I don't think…I don't think Robert ever considered the possibility that there wouldn't be a baby either."

Mary shook her head. "No, I don't think considering negative possibilities is much in his nature."

"I keep wondering what would have happened if we'd known last winter that this baby wasn't…" _Going to live,_ she finished silently. _Wondering_ , of course, was not quite the word. She knew exactly what would have happened if they'd known the baby would never be born.

"Do you regret your marriage, Cora?"

"No." She didn't, truly, because if she had it to do over again, she imagined she'd still marry Robert. She'd fallen too hard for him, come to love him too much, to ever regret marrying him. "But Robert does."

Mary's eyes narrowed. "Did he tell you this?"

"Not…directly."

"Tell me what's happened."

Cora paused, feeling her face redden at the thought of repeating the story…but what did it matter now? "A couple weeks ago, I confused his phone with mine, and I saw a text he had sent a friend telling him that he married me because I was pregnant. And of course, now I'm not pregnant."

"Oh, my darling…have you talked with Robert about this?"

Cora shook her head. She could not _imagine_ talking with Robert.

"You _must_ , Cora. You must find out what he meant by it; you must tell him what you're thinking. He _does_ love you; I know he does—and you must let him tell you."

Cora shook her head. "I can't tell him what I saw; I…I _can't_." She was horrified at the very thought, because she could not imagine what Robert might say in response. To hear the confirmation from his lips... "I–I didn't even tell him I had miscarried at first. Did he tell you I kept it from him for a day? Did he tell you that?"

There was surprise in Mary's eyes, but her voice stayed even. "No, he didn't tell me that."

"I did. I–I didn't know how to tell him, so for hours, I–I just…I didn't know how I would _ever_ tell him—and I know he's angry about that, and I understand why he's angry—but I _couldn't_ , because–because I _know_ he's going to suggest soon that I just go home, and I _can't_." She couldn't go back to New York or Ohio, not now. Not while Robert stayed in London.

Cora had thought she had run dry of tears in the last two days, but they were spilling over again, in spite of her best efforts to hold them at bay in front of the dowager countess.

"Oh, my dear child," Mary whispered, setting her cup down and moving to embrace her. "Robert loves you," she said as she brought Cora's head to her shoulder. "You're not going to have to go anywhere."

What was worse, though? Going home divorced, or carrying on with a husband who regretted marrying her? "I just wish–I wish it hadn't _happened_ ," she said through her tears, suddenly too tired to argue as she rested her forehead against Mary's neck. "I just want—I just want my baby."

"I know, love," she heard the older woman say softly as she felt her fingers stroke through her hair. "I know."

* * *

AN: There is only one more chapter left (I think), but I've fallen behind and I haven't even started on it. This is my last week of the semester, so I have an exam and a final project, and then Friday I'm off for a weekend trip, so I don't think I can get it written and polished by next Sunday. So I think we may have to take a one-week hiatus...but I promise to have the final chapter up by Dec. 18 at the latest! :-)


	22. Chapter 22

AN: I'm posting on what's early Friday in the UK, instead of on Sunday, in honor of a friend's birthday...happy birthday to Countess of Cobert! I hope you have an awesome day. :-)

* * *

 _I wish I knew how to help you!_ Felice's message read. Facebook Messenger's three dots bounced across the screen, to be replaced by _Do you want me to come see you?_ and then _I'll be on a plane tomorrow if it would help._

Cora was flopped across her bed, messaging with Felice—who had suggested a Skype conversation, but Cora found it far easier to text than to talk, as her throat still had a tendency to clog with tears when she thought about the baby.

She and Robert had endured another two days of silence and of avoiding each other's presence, with Robert still sleeping in the spare room. She did not honestly know what to say to him, as there seemed to be nothing to discuss but how and when to end their failed marriage. The phrase, "When would you like me to go home?" had been on the tip of her tongue a time or two, but the words had tasted like acid, and she had swallowed them.

The only sentences that had passed between them had begun with a muttered, "I'm sorry," from Robert yesterday afternoon.

"What?" she'd asked, not sure if she'd heard him.

"I'm sorry," he'd repeated, carefully studying the mail he had just brought in. "I'm sorry I shouted at you after you…that is, on Thursday," he amended quietly.

She shook her head. "No, I'm sorry I…I'm sorry I lost…" She could not bring herself to say _the baby_.

Robert sighed. "Don't say that. It wasn't your fault."

And it wasn't, of course. She knew that. It wasn't her fault she'd miscarried, any more than it was his fault he wasn't in love with her. Yet it had been her body that had denied them this chance at happiness, that had prevented her from giving him a child and _making_ him love her.

"I…I meant to…" But she couldn't talk about how much she'd wanted to have the baby, because her eyes were filling and her throat was closing. "Excuse me," she'd squeaked and darted off toward the bedroom again, where Robert had not followed her.

Cora pushed the memory away, focusing on Felice's message. _No reason for you to come,_ she typed. _I'll probably be back in the U.S. soon._

 _Graduation?_ Felice wrote.

She was almost surprised to see the word, for the coming ceremony—and her and Robert's coming trip to New York—had been the furthest things from her mind. _I meant moving home,_ she typed. But the last word seemed so strange that she deleted it before she pressed send, replacing it with _back_.

 _Have you and Robert decided it would be better for you to be closer to your family now?_

Cora swallowed, waiting a few seconds before beginning to type her response. _I don't think we'll stay together,_ she finally typed, feeling a sob rise in her chest.

Felice's next message was a string of question marks, followed by, _What?_

 _I didn't know this at the time…but Robert only married me b/c I was pregnant. So…_

The phone buzzed with an incoming Messenger call, and Cora sighed, dreading the conversation she'd waded into.

"Look, that's not true," Felice said firmly as soon as Cora accepted the call. "I know you don't feel like talking, but I wanted you to _hear_ me say this and not just read it. And Robert _did not_ marry you because you were pregnant. Absolutely not."

She wanted to appreciate the defense of Robert's love, but she didn't have the strength to argue about this. "Please don't," she said softly. "I'm glad you think that, but I know the truth now."

"No, you don't," Felice said matter-of-factly. "I don't think you've got any idea when Robert decided to propose. You can't, or you would know it was before you were pregnant. Before you guys even had sex."

Cora held her breath. Had Robert…conveyed some intention of marriage to Felice earlier in the winter?

"Do you remember when your class ring went missing?"

"I…yes," she said, surprised at the sudden change of subject. "But—"

"So…you were right about that. I did steal it."

 _"What?"_

"I was the one who took it," Felice repeated. "Not for myself; for Robert. He had asked me to steal it out of the bathroom some night and give it to him, so that he could take it and get it sized. Because he wanted to buy you an engagement ring, and he wanted it to fit right when he gave it to you.

"All of which happened before you got pregnant. So he may not have gotten around to proposing before that happened, but he was _absolutely_ planning on it. He'd already bought your ring. So I don't know what's given you the impression he only married you because of the baby, but you're wrong about that. It doesn't square with him buying an engagement ring earlier."

* * *

"When did you buy my engagement ring?"

Robert looked up from the television to see Cora hovering in the doorframe, and he slowly turned the volume down. "What?" He had heard her, but it had been such a strange inquiry that his first response was to question it rather than to answer it.

"When did you buy my engagement ring?" she repeated, and he flicked the television off.

"I don't know…last winter, sometime, I guess." Cora nodded. "What difference does it make?"

She didn't answer at first, chewing her lip with the withdrawn hesitancy she'd acquired since the miscarriage, and he sighed, irritated with her again. "What is it, Cora?"

"Felice just told me she helped you get the size from my class ring," she said quietly.

"Yes, she did." Why were they talking about this?

"And that was before Valentine's Day."

"Was it?" He thought for a moment. "Yes, it was, because I had thought about proposing on Valentine's Day, but I wanted it to be its own special occasion. Why are you asking me all this?" She chewed her lip again. "Cora?" When she did not answer, he reached for the remote—it was so much easier to ignore her than to decode her, especially now, when he was still angry over how she'd pushed him away.

"When did you decide to marry me?" she said, the words rushing together before he could press the power button.

That bit he remembered very clearly. "The day I came back from England after my father died. Why are you asking me all this?"

"Because I'm not sure why you married me."

The statement—said clearly and firmly, with a conviction that had not been matched in her earlier utterances—felt like a slap. "Dammit, Cora, we love each other. What do you mean, you're not sure why I married you?"

She raised her chin slightly, determinedly. "You sent your friend John a text telling him you married me because I was pregnant."

"What?" He couldn't have sent any such text, because it simply wasn't true. Of course he hadn't married Cora because she was pregnant—why would he have said so to John? "Cora, that's insane."

"It's quite true. I picked your phone up at Easter, thinking it was mine, and I saw it. And I don't understand how you buying a ring before we'd even had sex makes any sense at all if you were just marrying me because of the baby."

An uneasy feeling settled into Robert's stomach. What had she seen on his phone that she had taken that way? He knew he wouldn't have claimed to be marrying her because of her pregnancy, but she had very clearly misinterpreted a text to mean just that. And, he was realizing slowly, it had been roughly around Easter that she had begun to seem so…odd. Melancholy, he had thought a few times.

Almost frightened of what he would find, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and opened his thread with John. "Show me this text," he said, stretching his arm out to pass her the phone.

She came forward and took it, and he watched her scroll through the thread, scanning the messages, until at last she stopped. "It's…oh." Her cheeks pinkened, comprehension dawning across her face. "I'd only seen the end part of it."

He snatched his phone back and read the text that was now at the top of the screen. _Yeah I'd definitely been thinking we'd marry in the summer. But then there was the baby. We got married in March b/c she was pregnant._

Yes, he could easily imagine Cora being upset if all she had read had been the last sentence…but how could she not have bothered to scroll up slightly? How could she have taken something so ridiculous at face value? How could she have believed in this for a second? Didn't she _know_ he loved her?

"Cora, what were you _thinking_?" He could hear the irritation in his voice, and he saw her shrink back in response, but he didn't particularly care. "How could you have thought I didn't love you? Did you not give this any thought _at all_?"

She shook her head, her eyes on the carpet. Just as he was about to turn away from her again, he heard her murmur softly, "I thought you loved me because of the baby…and if I had the baby…"

And suddenly, he got it. Cora had, for whatever incomprehensible reason, leapt to conclusions from the text she'd seen—and perhaps that would not have been so difficult in her situation, young and pregnant and newly married to a husband she had known only briefly, and living thousands of miles from anyone and anything she had ever known. And so she'd hung her hopes on the baby, perhaps telling herself that once she'd had the child, of course her husband would love her. But then, of course, she'd miscarried.

No wonder she hadn't called him. No wonder she'd buried the news, dreading telling him. No wonder she hadn't been able to bear his presence in the aftermath.

And he, of course, had responded by shouting at her for not sharing the miscarriage immediately, and then barely spoken to her since.

"Oh, my darling," he breathed, reaching out for her. "Oh my darling, _darling_ Cora." She moved willingly into his arms, letting him pull her down onto his lap where she buried her face against his neck. His skin quickly grew wet with her silent tears, and he kissed the top of her head, feeling a hollow ache in his chest at the thought of what she'd felt. "I love you. I love you very much."

"The baby…" he heard her whisper, and the pain in his chest sharpened. He squeezed her tightly, and she nestled closer against him.

"I thought—I thought you would want me to go home," she said after another moment.

It seemed a nonsensical statement at first—she had been home for days. "But you are home," he said. And then he realized she'd meant the U.S. "Oh, I—"

But Cora silenced him with a finger to his lips. "No, you're right. I am home."

* * *

AN: So rather a lot of people have been asking if we can have an epilogue, or somehow see Cobert with a healthy baby in the future of this AU. That hadn't been my original plan, but I realize that my readers were probably very attached to this baby (at least, I hope you were!), and it really wasn't fair to cheat you out of the rest of Cora's pregnancy and then finally the birth, just for the sake of my plot. ;-) So I'm going to go ahead and write a short epilogue that's set a year or two in the future.

I'm not quite sure when I'll get to it, between Christmas stuff and the fact that I'm spending January abroad and I'm trying to get last-minute stuff together. :-) But my goal is to get it written and posted before the end of 2016...because nobody will be thinking about this story by the time I get home again in February!


	23. Epilogue

AN: All right, here's the epilogue I felt I owed you...fluff, a very pregnant Cora, Robert fussing, and (eventually) a healthy baby. Enjoy!

* * *

 _Three years later_

"Now, I believe you said something about ice cream?" Robert said, smiling down at Cora, whom he had just helped settle onto the couch. She was two weeks past her due date, and—although Robert had been careful never to say so aloud—he was quite simply amazed at how massive her belly was. He thought it, and she, were breathtakingly beautiful, but he also could not imagine how her small frame could support the weight. With difficulty, he supposed, if her grunts and her huffing and puffing and her frequent need for his help getting up were any indication.

"Yes, please," she said, smiling back. "And thank you again for getting that."

He kissed her temple, taking the opportunity to caress her belly again. "Of course, darling. Anything to make you happy. What flavor would you like?"

Earlier in her pregnancy, Cora had told him in passing that what she craved most was Graeter's, the special ice cream made in her hometown of Cincinnati…and he had immediately found the company online, discovered they shipped for free within the eastern half of the U.S., and paid an astronomical amount to have several cartons of the stuff overnighted to London. At these prices, there had better be bars of gold tucked in between the ice cream, he'd thought, but he'd been rewarded when a very hormonal Cora had burst into tears upon finding it tucked in the freezer and thrown her arms around him, covering him in kisses.

Tonight was Valentine's Day, and Robert's original plan had been to make them dinner at home. He'd very much expected the baby to be here by now, and even if it weren't, he doubted Cora would feel like dressing up and going anywhere. She had not had an easy pregnancy and had often been so miserable as she neared its end that, at Robert's suggestion, she had left her job at the V&A at the end of the year, rather than working up until the birth. It has not seemed to matter so much at the time, as she'd not intended to return to work once the baby was born, but the end result was that she'd grown increasingly restless over the past six weeks as she'd watched the clock and the calendar.

And so he had not been surprised when she'd insisted on going out for a formal Valentine's dinner, and he had not wanted to deny her. Instead of dessert at the restaurant, though, she'd suggested they go home for Graeter's. He suspected her desire to cut the evening short stemmed from how taxing she was finding it—a suspicion that had been confirmed by her difficulty getting out of the cab and the heavy way she'd leaned on his arm on the way into their building.

Cora pursed her lips, considering flavors. "Oh, it doesn't matter, I don't think. Whatever's on top."

He went into the kitchen, where he removed her three favorite ice creams from the freezer, dropping scoops of cinnamon and black cherry chocolate chip and simple, plain chocolate into a bowl, and then filled the hot water bottle she'd grown fond of.

"Oh, you brought heat for me—bless you," she said as he stepped back into the room. "My back is throbbing."

"I figured," he said, giving her another kiss on the forehead as she sat up slightly, letting him slip the hot water bottle between her spine and the pillow she was resting against. "And I've got a full sundae for you."

"Oh, I didn't need so much," she said as he passed her the bowl of ice cream, but she attacked it immediately with the spoon he'd brought, and he chuckled. "Don't you want any for yourself, Robert?" she asked as he took a seat on the couch at her feet.

"No, sweetheart, the Graeter's is all for you. And I want to take care of you while you eat it. Your feet are swelling again," he said, taking them into his lap and beginning a gentle massage.

She sighed. "Thanks." They lapsed into silence, and he took the opportunity to study her as she ate, her attention intently focused on her bowl. The tip of her tongue slipped out to lick a bit of ice cream from her lips, and he thought immediately of the kisses they had shared earlier that evening in the back of a cab.

He let his gaze wander further down her body, his eyes caressing the breasts that had filled out in recent months, as well as, of course, her belly. The words Cora had applied to herself at the end of her pregnancy had been along the lines of _cow_ , _elephant_ , and _whale_ , but he didn't think anything could have been further from the truth. He thought the swell of their baby was absolutely beautiful, and Cora had only grown prettier as she'd grown bigger, her face taking on a sweet, new roundness to match the rest of her body. Robert was eager to meet the baby, and eager for Cora's discomfort to end, but he suspected he'd very much miss the sight of his pregnant wife and the feel of her belly under his hands.

He watched as she shifted awkwardly, pushing her shoulders back with a slight wince, trying to ease one of her aches, and he felt the familiar sensation of his heart expanding, as though it were not sure it was going to remain in his chest. Oh, how he loved this woman, loved every inch of her—and how strange it was, as he still occasionally thought, to imagine that she had spent the beginning of their marriage believing he didn't love her at all. For what he had loved most about that unborn baby—and what he loved most about this one—was that they were Cora's babies, that they were taking shape inside _Cora_.

"Are you all right, darling?" he asked her now.

She sighed. "I'm all right enough."

He watched as she reached the bottom of the ice cream bowl, scraping along it with the spoon. "Would you like me to get you some more?" he asked, hiding a smile at the memory of her protest that it was too much when he had first brought it to her.

Cora shook her head and set the empty bowl on what was left of her lap. "No, I think that's enough…and thank you for the massage. That does feel wonderful…I'm not sure how my feet are so sore when I only walk to and from the bathroom."

"Well, you do that so often now that it probably adds up to a good nine or ten miles a day."

"Your baby is sitting on my bladder!"

"You're nearly there, sweetheart. Not much longer."

"I feel like it's going to go on for _months_ ," she said, her voice quietly strained. "Do you know how long it is until my due date? Negative twelve days! This baby was supposed to come on the second!"

"Yes, but it's not going to go on for months. You won't be pregnant past Tuesday," he said gently, reminding her of when the doctor had said she'd be induced if her labor hadn't begun on its own. "That's only another four days."

"I'm not sure I can last another four _hours_ ," she said with another sigh, pressing her hand to her hip and arching her back slightly. "My hips feel like they're _breaking_ , and my back is absolutely on fire."

"I know, sweetheart, I know," he soothed.

"I'm sorry I complain so much," she added quickly—as she always did in these conversations.

"You don't complain much at all," he said truthfully. "Certainly not as much as I would."

Cora smiled, and he knew she was remembering the couple of times she had witnessed him with a mild head cold, learning immediately that a Robert who did not feel one hundred percent was not a Robert who was fit to interact with other human beings.

"Darling, I think we should get you to bed," he told her as he watched her yawn.

She nodded, struggling to push herself up. "I feel like a bug that's been flipped on its back," she muttered. "A really _fat_ bug."

"Here, don't get up," he said, standing himself. "Let me carry you." After watching Cora limp down the hall to their apartment, he didn't want her to have to walk any further tonight.

"Don't, Robert," she protested as he stooped over her. "I must weigh four hundred pounds; you shouldn't try to lift me."

"Oh, I would say you're closer to three-fifty," he said seriously as he picked her up, prompting a soft giggle. She snuggled close to him as he took her back to their bedroom, and he savored the softness and warmth of having her in his arms.

Once he'd helped her into her pajamas, she curled up on her right side in bed, groaning softly as he eased extra pillows under her belly and between her knees. "Are you comfortable, love?" he asked, and she nodded. He brushed a kiss to her cheek and then climbed into bed behind her, beginning to rub her lower back, as had become his habit in the evenings. Eventually, he felt her relaxing under his hand, and she gave a soft sigh. "Better?" he asked quietly.

"Yes, but don't stop yet, please. That's helping."

He kissed her shoulder, his fingers still working in firm circles at the base of her spine. After awhile, he heard her whisper, her voice sleepy, "Could you hold me now?"

"Of course, darling." He shifted closer to her, his arm stretching over her swollen stomach, and Cora murmured softly as she leaned back against him. She'd grown fond of falling asleep this way.

"I love you," she said quietly as he lightly stroked her belly, hoping to ease her into sleep.

"I love you, too, sweetheart." He kissed her shoulder again. "Happy Valentine's Day."

"Robert?" she said after a moment.

"Yes, love?"

"I've been thinking…I'm not so sure I want to name this baby Jade."

"Were you thinking you want to go ahead with Summer?" They had discussed using the name they'd planned for their first baby several years ago, but Cora had said it felt too odd to her, and that this child should have its own identity, not simply be a replacement for the one that had been lost.

"No…I was thinking…" She paused to yawn. "I was wondering if maybe we should…" She trailed off, stiffening in his arms.

His hand stilled on her belly. "Are you all right? Does something hurt?" She didn't respond, and he felt himself tensing with worry. "Cora?"

"I'm okay," she said, and he heard the excitement in her voice. "But we need to get to the hospital. My water's breaking."

* * *

"You are both so beautiful."

She could tell from Robert's voice that he was smiling, but she didn't look up—her gaze was fixed steadily on the new baby, and she had no interest in tearing her eyes away.

After an all-night labor, Cora had finally given birth just two hours ago to the little girl they'd been expecting. As exhausted as she was, and as much as she wanted to sleep, she could not bring herself to surrender the baby, who she was clutching close to her chest. With the help and encouragement of a nurse, she'd fed her shortly after the birth, and now the infant was resting quietly in Cora's arms, big blue eyes staring up at her mother's.

"She looks just like you," she heard Robert say. "I've been praying she would look like you."

Cora felt another tear slip from her eye and spill down her cheek. This had been going on since she'd first been given the baby, and she didn't think of it as crying—it was simply that her heart was so full that some of the happiness was forced to leak out of her eyes.

Robert brushed it away then softly kissed her forehead. "I think you should get some sleep. You've had a miserably difficult night. I promise she'll still be here when you wake up."

Cora shook her head. "Just a few more minutes."

Robert chuckled. "Why don't I at least hold her so that you can lie back? You'll still be able to see her, and you'll be more comfortable."

She didn't think there was any position as comfortable as having her baby in her arms, but it occurred to her that it was slightly selfish to refuse to let go when Robert had not yet held the child they had created together. And so with yet another kiss to the baby's head, she carefully transferred her to Robert's arms. More tears spilled out as she saw her husband smile so broadly she thought his face might crack.

"I believe we were interrupted last night when you mentioned names," he said suddenly, once Cora was settled and lying flat.

Yes, they had been. She'd forgotten in the stress of the night and the joy of holding the baby, but she had yet to get Robert's consent to the name she'd been silently calling their daughter.

"I was wondering," she said, "about calling her Mary. After Gran."

The idea had hit her one afternoon last month as she'd sat curled up on the couch, chatting with her grandmother-in-law as the old lady—who had spent much of the winter visiting and looking after a very pregnant Cora—made her and Robert dinner in the flat's kitchen. In the three years since Cora had moved to England, Gran had quite simply become her best friend. Robert's mother had never warmed to her, and while she liked Rosamund, her sister-in-law was a better companion for a wild night out than for an intimate conversation. Nor had she bonded particularly strongly with any of the other women she had befriended at work or through Robert's friends.

It was not a situation that had surprised her—Cora had never been given to having a long list of people with whom she was emotionally close. She formed such bonds rarely, and only when she felt completely and utterly at ease…as she always had with Robert's grandmother. And once the idea had occurred to her, it had seemed the most natural thing in the world.

Robert's eyebrows shot up in response to the suggestion. "Christ, you sure know how to wind my mother up."

It was the last response Cora had been expecting, and she laughed. "So you don't think we should?" she asked, sobering.

"No, I didn't say that. It will drive my mother wild, but that may only be another point in the name's favor." Cora giggled. "I say yes. We both love Gran, and she's certainly taken you into her heart. I like family names anyway, and I can't tell you how much I would prefer Lady Mary Crawley to Lady _Jade_ Crawley."

Cora smiled sheepishly. She'd known Robert was very much giving way to her on the name choices when he'd approved both Summer and Jade.

"And anyway, I think my mum is going to be furious enough when she learns that Gran was the first to hear about and see the baby. We might as well do the thing properly." Robert had called his grandmother last night, and she had made plans to take the train up this morning, having agreed to stay with the couple for a few days after the new baby was brought home. Violet, meanwhile, was not even aware that her daughter-in-law had gone into labor.

"Mary, then." Cora reached out to stroke her finger against her daughter's cheek.

"Mary Josephine, perhaps," Robert suggested. "My other grandmother was Josephine—that might calm my mother somewhat if we used that for a middle name."

Cora nodded, a yawn escaping her.

"You need sleep, darling," Robert said, his voice gentle but firm. "Close your eyes—Mary and I will be right here."

Her eyes seemed to close of their own accord, and she felt his hand stroke over her hair—the same warm hand that was holding their baby, she thought as she drifted off to sleep.

* * *

AN: It's always been my headcanon that Cora and Robert's grandmother were close, that it drove Violet up the wall, and that Mary is named for her. :-)

Thank you all for joining me for this story! I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it. I have some traveling coming up this winter, so it will be awhile before I write again, but I'm sure I'll be back. I hope you've had a very merry Christmas - happy 2017!


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